As it was not in the beginning, it will not always be. (1921)

From the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

In human history, just as in all other directions, the principle of change operates. Social systems arise, grow, and decay, just as animals and plants do, the new system being a growth out of the older system.

A glance along the path the human race has traversed in its development brings to light the fact that there have arisen at different times certain fundamentally different social systems, and in each epoch the people of the period have had their own particular outlook on life; as the epochs have been fundamentally different, so have the ideas of the times.

Until the latter half of the last century the early history of mankind was, comparatively speaking, something of a mystery. There was no guide or key to assist investigators ; no scientific theory to bring order out of the apparent chaos and render fruitful and intelligible in this field the work of ethnologists and archaeologists ; all was shrouded in darkness.

To the late Lewis Henry Morgan, the American ethnologist, we are indebted for the clearing away of the clouds that obscured man's early social history. His laborious, careful, and lengthy investigations have not only provided us with a wealth of material, but have also given us the key to the progressive movement of man from Savagery through Barbarism to Civilisation. Morgan analysed and explained the development of the Gens (the blood relationships and all that this signified) and the part it played in primitive society.

Since Morgan published the results of his investigations, other workers in the same field have followed the paths he pointed out, so that we now have ample material to enable us to understand primitive society.

In view of the attempt on the part of Capitalist professors to spread the false idea that Capitalism, in one form or another, has always existed, the work of Morgan is especially valuable to the Socialist movement. He has provided us with indisputable proof of the existence in the past of communities practising communal ownership; and he has shown that the introduction of private property broke up the old societies founded upon kinship and started society off on a new career founded upon private property—the territorial tie. The re-introduction of communism—the aim of the Socialist—will write finis to the social systems based upon property, and bring society to a new communism—but communism upon a vastly higher scale; communism with the advantages that will accrue from all the discoveries and accumulated means of wealth-production obtained by the human race at such a cost of blood and tears and misery to the wealth producers since society passed out of primitive communism into early civilisation.

If a broad glance be taken at history, it will be found that four distinct forms of society have existed at successive periods in social development, i.e., the Primitive, the Antique, the Feudal, and the Capitalistic. In each of these social systems the method of obtaining the means to satisfy social needs, or, to put the matter more simply, the way in which wealth was produced, differed. In the Primitive commune all the able-bodied members took their allotted part in obtaining what was required to satisfy the needs of the commune, and as all shared the work, so they also shared the fruit of their, work. In the Antique system, which flourished during the palmy days of Greece and Rome, the wealth of society was obtained by means of the work of chattel slaves, and the wealth produced flowed into the hands of Greek and Roman proprietors. Under Feudalism the bond slave was the beast of burden, and the feudal proprietor the appropriator of the wealth obtained. In our day, the day of fully-fledged Capitalism, the wage-slave does the toiling and moiling in the obtaining of the means of social existence, whilst all the wealth produced is owned by the Capitalist proprietor.

So far, then, each social system had a different economic foundation—its own peculiar method of satisfying its needs. But each system has not been what we may call "self-developed" ; that is to say, they have not grown from separate isolated seeds. Each has grown out of the preceding system. The question that immediately confronts us, then, is : What has been the dynamic factor of the matter? What has caused one to be transformed into the other? How, for example, came society to forsake its communistic basis for a private property basis?

In the first place, Karl Marx subjected this point to a thorough analysis and elucidated the cause of social change. But, independently of Marx, Morgan also solved the problem, and his investigations shed light on the matter.

Morgan divided early social development into two main periods—Savagery and Barbarism ; and these periods he split up into six sub-periods—lower, middle, and upper stages of Savagery, and lower, middle, and upper stages of Barbarism. The transition from one sub-period to another is marked by the discovery of a new means to obtain from nature a better subsistence. For example, the transition from the earliest form of social existence to the middle stage of Savagery was marked by the discovery of fire; the transition to the upper stage of Savagery was accomplished by the invention of bows and arrows; the discovery of pottery introduced the lower stage of Barbarism ; the cultivation of food plants and the domestication of animals introduced the middle stage of Barbarism; the melting of iron ore the upper stage of Barbarism; and the invention of letter script and its utilisation for writing records brought mankind to the threshold of Civilisation.

Each of the different discoveries mentioned brought mankind into better harmony with natural forces; enabled him to take greater advantage of the latter to the end that he obtained a better subsistence. But the increase in the means of production, the obtaining of a better and easier subsistence, led to the production of a surplus over and above what the community immediately required, and this in turn led to a struggle for the ownership of the surplus. Here we have the embryonic class struggle, the germ of future class struggles and social systems. Society had developed to the point where all need not be workers, owing to the fruitfulness of the wealth-producing appliances; hence the struggle as to who should own and who should work these appliances; the establishment of a class of owners (the introduction of private property); and the struggle between the owning and producing classes, which, as fresh method of obtaining wealth were discovered, gave birth to new social systems with new social classes.

The following quotations from Morgan's chief work, "Ancient Society," on the introduction of private property, are an example of his insight and grasp of the matter :

  ''When field agriculture had demonstrated that the whole surface of the earth could be made the subject of property owned by individuals in severally, and it was found that the head of the family became the natural centre of accumulation, the new property career of mankind was inaugurated. It was fully done before the later period of barbarism. A little reflection must convince anyone of the powerful influence property would now begin to exercise upon the human mind, and of the great awakening of new elements of character it was calculated to produce. Evidence appears, from many sources, that the feeble impulse aroused in the savage mind had now become a tremendous passion in the splendid barbarian of the heroic age. Neither archaic nor later usages could maintain themselves in such an advanced condition. The time had now arrived when monogamy, having assured the paternity of children, would assert and maintain their exclusive right to inherit the property of their deceased father."—pp. 553-554.
  "During the Later Period of Barbarism a new element, that of aristocracy, had a marked development. The individuality of persons, and the increase of wealth now possessed by individuals in masses, were laying the foundation of personal influence. Slavery, also, by permanently degrading a portion of the people, tended to establish contrasts of condition unknown in the previous ethnical periods. This, with property and official position, gradually developed the sentiment of aristocracy, which has so deeply penetrated modern  society, and antagonised the democratical principles created and fostered by the gentes. It soon disturbed the balance of society by introducing unequal privileges, and degrees of respect for individuals among people of the same nationality, and these became the source of discord and strife." —Page 560.
  "Since the advent of civilization, the outgrowth of property has been so immense, its forms so diversified, its uses so expanding, and its management so intelligent in the interests of its owners, that it has become, on the part of the people, an unmanageable power. The human mind stands bewildered in the presence of its own creation. The time will come, nevertheless, when human intelligence will rise to the mastery over property, and define the relations of the state to the property it protects, as well as the obligations and the limits of the rights of its owners. The interests of society are paramount to individual interests, and the two must be brought into just and harmonious relations. A mere property career is not the final destiny of mankind if progress is to be the law of the future as it has been of the past. The time which has passed away since civilization began is but a fragment of the past duration of man's existence, and but a fragment of the ages yet to come. The dissolution of society bids fair to become the termination of a career of which property is the end and aim ; because such a career contains the elements of self-destruction. Democracy in government, brotherhood in society, equality in rights and privileges, and universal education, foreshadow the next higher plane of society to which experience, intelligence and knowledge are steadily tending. It will be a revival, in a higher form, of the liberty, equality and fraternity of the ancient gentes."— pp. 561-562.

The above quotations are an indication of the remarkable insight and thorough grasp of his material Morgan had. Perhaps it will be an incentive to the reader to get a closer acquaintance with Morgan's writings. In particular, a study of "Ancient Society" would reward well the effort expended.

From the foregoing it can be seen that each social system has had at the back of it an older one, right away back to the time when our ancestors forsook their arborial abodes for the solid ground. Just as each social system has given birth to or foreshadowed a later system, so Capitalism at the high tide of its development foreshadows another system in which the evils that flow from the economic foundations of Capitalism will cease to exist; economic insecurity will be as remote as the marvellous development of science can make it; no longer will those toiling myriads be bowed down with the weight of economic troubles, and the miseries we know to-day will disappear as snow before the sun.

Gilmac.

Jottings. (1921)

The Jottings Column from the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

On the economic field there is constant conflict between the masters and the workers, each in turn fighting to reduce and increase this common standard of subsistence. If, therefore, a section of the master class are successful in shifting the burden of taxation imposed upon them by Parliament, for the purposes before mentioned, it amounts to the fact that by so doing they have succeeded in reserving for their sectional interest a larger proportion of the surplus value, which they and their class as a whole filch from the workers.

The activities of Lansbury and Co., therefore, in the interests ot the local industrial capitalists and landlords (our George is one of 'em), is another illustration of the political profiteering of this "Come to Jesus" humbug. There are others besides him, and the Communist Party of Great Britain do not intend to be caught napping by anyone after "Stunt Championships." Listen to what they have to say on the issue :

 "Poplar Borough Council is in gaol. It has done more in one week for the workers than all the other Labour Councils have done in all their little lives." . . ."The assumption of everyone was that a Labour Council in Poplar would be good and carry out the 'precept' of the L.C.C. —levy, as usual, money, that must be wrung, at any rate immediately, from the starving to save the pockets of the wealthy West Enders." —"The Communist," 17th Sept., 1921. 

The Communist Party of Great Britain, affiliated to the Third International, claiming to base its actions on the Marxian doctrines ! Phew ! Revolutionary substitutes.

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"America is the home of the free," so they say. We happen to know, however, that the workers in that country, faced with a capitalist system of production, are subject to similar evils that afflict the workers everywhere that system obtains. They do things on a much "higher" scale in America, however. For instance, we read the following from the "Daily News," 3rd Sept., 1921 :—

  "According to latest advices from Mingo, the recalcitrant miners of West Virginia are to be attacked forthwith by American aviators with tear bombs and gas bombs . . . merely a very modern form of police protection. It is probably a tip taken from a recent German book which showed how effectively aeroplanes could be employed in times of peace for dispersing unauthorised assemblies. If the American bomb droppers really get going they will be able to show the Black and Tans a thing or two."

Overlooking the sardonic suggestion to the Government for a speedy means of settling the Irish question, contained in the last sentence of the above, we did not think that the American masters would devise such an ingenious way of bringing their slaves—with tears in their eyes—to their proper senses. But the Yankee worker will tell you—chewing gum the time—that "he won the war" and that "America is God's own country—believe me." But he forgets to add "for the American Capitalist."

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  "The day may be far distant when the actual political arrangements of the world will realise the highest ideal of which our social instincts are capable; but every life honestly spent in the faithful service of the Commonweal, every hour devoted to the earnest study of the public good, brings that day more surely within our reach." —"History of Politics," Ed. Jenks, M.A.

The object of the Socialist Party is the establishment of Socialism, a system of society wherein the means of production will be owned and controlled by the producers, the Working Class. It is because these means of production are privately owned by the Capitalist Class to-day that millions of the workers throughout the world are in need of food, clothing, and shelter. Wealth is socially produced; it is the result of the co-operation of effort of the Working Class of the world applied to natural resources. But this wealth and the means for producing it are privately owned. It is this antagonism which the Socialist Party is out to abolish. Under the Socialist system harmony will take the place of the existing chaos, because there will be social production side by side with social ownership. This change in the social order is the revolutionary ideal of the Socialist. All else is illusion.

Workers, mark well the words contained in the above quotation, and fit yourselves for the mission which historical development demands—that you shall, by the power ot your own individual and collective effort of muscle and brain, some day triumphantly achieve. When you will, who shall say you nay?

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"Compromise is virtual death. It is the pact between cowardice and comfort, under the title of expediency."—George Meredith.

Great brains think alike, so it is said. Note the hostility clause in the Declaration of Principles at the back hereof, and in conjunction therewith, write for a copy of  our Manifesto, which explains our attitude of hostility towards all other parties. Price 3d., post free 3½d.

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"CALMLY STRIVING." 

 "A sunny view of world and life 

As balm for brain and heart, 

It is with health and beauty rife, 

With noblest works of art. 

But do not for a moment think 

That it is captured in a wink. 

The golden harvest does not grow

 Unless the early tempests blow. 

And only bitter woe and strain 

Will bright and lofty wisdom gain." 

—Fr. von Sallet.

The present social structure was not conceived by any one man or number of supermen. It is the result of slow, steady evolutionary processes. So with the new order—the Socialist society of free men and women—it will come when the time is ripe, when the productive forces are developed to the point when a change will be inevitable. Our message to the workers is: Be prepared for that time to welcome the birth of the new social order ; to herald in the Co-operative Commonwealth. As the poet puts it: "What is life?

'Tis not to walk about and draw fresh air
From time to time and gaze upon the sun.
'Tis to be free. When liberty is gone
Life grows insipid and has lost its relish."

To those who yawn in this black hell of Capitalism, arouse yourselves to the work of Working Class emancipation.

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Owing to the failure of the Working Class to understand their position in society, they easily become the victims of any Labour Shark desirous of fattening on their ignorance. At the present time, millions of workers unemployed or on short time are demonstrating in almost every city and town, demanding work or maintenance. Lacking knowledge, they are easily led into difficulties and conflicts with the Police. Quite recently in Liverpool the unemployed workers demonstrated in great numbers, and one of their number shouted, "Raid the Art Gallery."

Whatever could be obtained by capturing that object passes our comprehension.

The building was immediately rushed and occupied by the unemployed, but they were driven out by the Police with drawn batons, with the result that much damage to heads was done and many unemployed were arrested. We have often pointed out that so long as the workers fail to make a serious study of the Socialist proposition, that the private ownership of the means of life is alone the cause of unemployment and all its concomitant evils, the workers will, sheep-like, follow any politician or would-be Labour leader to their own destruction and disillusionment.

Apropos of the workers, we read the following in the Evening News (27/10/21) :

  "An extraordinary example of the way sheep will follow their leader, even to destruction, occurred here to-day (Yarmouth), when one of a flock of pedigree black-faced ewes attempted to eat some leaves which covered a disused well. The animal fell through the leaves and disappeared down the well. Other sheep immediately followed until 17 had leapt in. All were killed or suffocated before help arrived." 

Further comment would simply spoil it.

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It is becoming almost impossible now to pick up any of the daily papers without reading in their columns terribly distressing stories of privation, starvation, suicide, or murder consequent upon the awful struggle for existence of the Working Class. If man's command over Nature had not reached the point it has, where, with the aid of wonderful machinery, he is able to produce wealth in abundance, such starvation and want in our midst to-day would be understandable. Millions to-day are idle, cannot obtain permission to manipulate the machinery of wealth production, and, with the raw material provided by Nature, fashion into the finished products we need for food, clothing and shelter. And yet we can read of the following in the so-called Twentieth Century of Enlightenment

"CRYING FOR BREAD." 

''It is one of these awful cases of dire distress and starvation," said Detective-inspector Hall, in the Thames Police-Court.
Emma Coughlin, aged 41, of Willis Street, Poplar, was remanded on a charge of attempting to murder her three children and commit suicide by means of coal gas.
When arrested she said : "I put some money in the gas and locked the bedroom door. I only did it to frighten him (evidently meaning her husband). I do not know why I did it.
The children are continually crying for bread, and I do not know where to get the money. . . . I sold some furniture and I have pawned nearly everything. I have no clothes for my bed. I did not know what to do." Evening News, 1/10/21

Bread, like every other form of wealth, can only be produced by applying human energy to Nature's resources.

The land, all in it and upon it—the workshops, factories and machinery, the mills, mines, and railroads, all the necessary tools and implements for producing and distributing wealth—are owned and controlled by a comparatively few people in society. The vast majority of the human race, being divorced from the means of life, obtain permission from the owners to produce wealth for the latter, with a view to profit, and in return receive a wage, just a portion of the total value produced.

When a profit is no longer forthcoming, and, incidentally, when the markets of the world are glutted with the good things of life, the workers in thousands remain idle and go without just at the time they should be enjoying the fruits of their energy. Such cases as above could never disgrace a system of society where the means of life were the common property of all, inasmuch as when the whole of those who are physically and mentally fit, capable of contributing their quota of energy in association with their fellows the world wide, would, when the wealth is produced, socially own, control, and enjoy the results of their social labour.

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That vile, sickly sentiment, of which only the Press of the Capitalist Class is capable, is once more being indulged in by the daily papers, concerning the coming anniversary of the signing of the Armistice.

Once more they are urging that November 11th should be a day of "National Observance" as paying a tribute to the "Heroic Dead."

If our masters were able to show and to prove that those who survived the terrible struggle in France and Flanders were passing through those "fields of waving corn" promised so often, which have never materialised, something might be said for the tribute they wish us to pay.

Right from when the last cannon and machine-gun spluttered forth its deadly missile, until the present time, the Working Class, including the ex-Service men, have faced a far worse struggle for existence than ever known before.

Since the last anniversary, the workers, irrespective of whether they had been in the armed forces or munition factories, fighting and slaying to maintain the "glorious prestige of the British Empire," have suffered a greatly reduced standard of subsistence as a result of the reductions in wages forced upon them by the Capitalist Class.

Far more common it is to-day to see the "brave lads" begging support in the streets, playing barrel-organs and generally trying to appeal to the generosity of our benevolent Ruling Class! Thousands are seeking employment, many of whom are physically wrecked on account of their experiences in the trenches. Their chance of employment is almost hopeless, and doubtless they will find their way to the heroes' home—the workhouse, or a premature grave, the victims of starvation.

The hypocritical Ruling Class will always pay tributes in words, but not in deeds. Those workers who perished fighting the battles of our masters to satisfy the latter's insatiable greed for profits, we know only too well, did so under a conception of patriotism drilled into them when young and fostered since.

Were it not for the fact that they have no understanding of their position in society, where they are divorced from the means of life, we should see them fighting the battles in the only fight that does matter —the Class War. We who lived through those four years of unparalleled destruction of precious human lives, say again, as we did in our September, 1914, issue of the Socialist Standard: "The struggle did not justify the shedding of one single drop of Working Class blood," and that it was "a commercial war being fought out in the interests of the Capitalist Class for the markets of the world in order to dispose of the wealth robbed from the workers." While we regret that so many workers of all countries lost their lives in the bloody shambles, the appeal of the Capitalist Class leaves us cold.

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On many occasions in the columns of the Socialist Standard we have pointed out that the object of Sinn Fein was to further the material interests of the manufacturing section of the Ruling Class of Ireland, and whatever be the outcome of the conflict between them and the British Government, the wealth producers of Ireland will find little alteration in their position. 

This question was dealt with more fully in our issue of June, 1917, but we do not think it would be out of place for our readers to note the following (Evening News, 3/10/21) :

"LABOUR TO FIGHT SINN FEIN.'' 

"Irish labour leaders do not hide their anxiety regarding the future under a Sinn Fein government. Sinn Fein is claiming greater powers than Ulster regarding the repeal of legislation passed by the United Kingdom Parliament, and in particular takes exception to restrictive trade union practices which are accused of stifling Irish industrial development.
"It is well-known that some of the most prominent men in Southern Ireland believe the Trades Disputes Acts to be inimical to Irish interests and will not assume responsibility for enforcing such laws in Ireland. Realising that they may have to fight their own Government harder than they did the British authorities, the Irish labourers are preparing for conflict.
"They threaten to fight every constituency in the towns, and expect that with the issue of self-government out of the way it will he easier to make headway against official Sinn Fein."

Members of the Communist Party and the S.L.P., please note.

O. C. I.

Editorial: Birds of a Feather. (1921)

Editorial from the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

To those who depend for their knowledge of politics on the Capitalist Press, there seems to be acute antagonism between the different parties striving for power. The Coalitionists regard the Liberal and Labour parties with indifference or contempt, while the two latter parties appear to be jealous and suspicious of one another, and the noisy Anti-Waste Party attacks all three parties with equal venom. The intensity, vulgarity and violence of party strife, however, is not always a safe guide as to the importance of the issues.

When the worker examines the issues of to-day in the light of reason, he must soon be convinced that, so far as he is concerned, they are not worth wasting time over. When he examines the reforms or principles of the different parties, he must speedily come to the conclusion that there is not sufficient difference between them to warrant him taking up sides. The programme of the Labour Party, for instance, is so little different from that of the Liberals, that arrangements are frequently made between the leaders to support each other's candidates, and the rank and file of the Labour Party vote for a Liberal as a matter of course when no Labour candidate is running.

It is clear from this that there can be no real antagonism between these two parties. The other parties, we know from experience, only contend in the political arena for control over the Parliamentary machine, with no intention of making any fundamental changes in the system. Liberals and Tories come and go, or coalesce, but Capitalism continues while they can do either. Thus all political parties prominently before the workers stand for Capitalism, their only differences being in the methods of administration.

Two things are necessary before we can pass judgment on any political party—Socialist knowledge and knowledge of the party's actions and utterances. By Socialist knowledge we mean a clear conception of the economic dependence and the political subjugation of the Working Class, together with the class antagonism that necessarily arises therefrom, and the necessity for conscious and organised action on the part of the workers for the overthrow of Capitalism and the establishment of Socialism. To the Labour Leader we go for information on the Labour Party's attitude and principles. Sir Leo Chiozza Money says (October 6th, 1921) :

  "How should a conscientious Labour man, who hopes and strives for a better condition of society and a saner economic system, treat the system that is ? Should his policy be one of co-operation or non-co-operation ? Should he do his best with the tools that are, or endeavour to clog, stop or destroy the machine in order to compel the making of a better one?
  "The Labour Party's answer to these questions is a common-sense one. The proposals it has issued dealing with unemployment, for example, seek to make the best of things as they are. In the background are the voices of revolution."

Where Sir Leo and all the birds in the Capitalist nest are doing their utmost to keep such voices ; in the background along with the Socialist knowledge that would enable the workers to understand their position. "The proposals of the Labour Party seek to make the best of things as they are." In these words the Labour Party is summed up and condemned—by its own scribe. How is it possible, at one and the same time, to show the rottenness of a system and the need for its abolition, while contending that it should be bolstered or patched up in order to make it last longer? All they do is to raise false hopes and lead the workers away from the only solution of their difficulties. Not only so. When they join hands with Liberals and Tories and tell the workers that the only way to deal with unemployment is to capture foreign markets, they lie. Followed to its logical conclusion, that policy increases instead of diminishes unemployment, because the faster the workers throw commodities into the world's market, the sooner they reach the goal of universal glut and stagnation.

Backed up by the Labour Party, the avowed Capitalist parties reduce wages all round, telling the workers that they cannot get more out of industry than they put in. Who stops them from putting more in? Mr. Lloyd George says the nation is producing now only 80 per cent. of its pre-war output, admits there are a million and a half unemployed through no fault of their own, and says that it is a world condition. The utter helplessness of Capitalist Governments in the face of the present crisis is apparent in every written and spoken sentence of the defenders of the system.

They are applying their minds to the question, says the Premier, but the only result from this application of great minds is, excuses for the failure of their system, accusations of ca'-canny against the workers, and schemes to get necessary work done by local councils at less than Trade Union rates of wages.

One of the greatest adepts in the art of making excuses for Capitalism is Chiozza Money. In nearly every copy of the Labour Leader, for weeks, he has been insisting that the workers must produce more cheaply and co-operate with the Capitalists to get back our lost trade, because this country is mainly dependent on exports and shipping. If his readers gave the question a moment's consideration, they would see in this nothing but a dirty imputation that they are not doing their share in the work of production; the truth, of course, being that the workers do it all. Moreover, going slow may be possible in isolated instances when workers are in demand, but in the present congested state of the labour market must be very rare indeed. Before the Capitalists of this country can regain their lost markets, exchanges must be stabilised and European industry restored, but that is a purely Capitalist question and can only be arranged between the different conflicting groups of Capitalists themselves. The Workers have no voice in the question and cannot increase the volume of trade until they are more fully employed.

The next move is, therefore, with the Capitalists. The gentlemen who are saying that the war debts between nations should  be wiped out have made this clear. The wheels of industry can only be made to revolve when exchanges are stabilised and the countries disorganised by the war resume their normal activities. Both the Premier and Chiozza Money agree that the slump is a world condition, but both of them neglect to add that every Capitalist country can produce far in excess of its own needs, and that this excess of production over national needs is the cause of slumps. Every country must find markets for its excess, and in proportion as it fails to do so, each country finds its unemployed increasing.

Restoration of trade is the only remedy, say the captains of industry, and their political agents, from the Premier to the most obscure Labour hack, repeat their cry. Birds of a feather, they all agree that their paymasters must extend their concerns. They are harnessed to the national car of industry, and serve Capitalist interests, not only against foreign Capitalists, but against the workers of their own land, whose continued exploitation and increasing poverty is thereby insured. Agreeing that the restoration of trade is the only remedy for unemployment, they differ as to the method, and gathering into little cliques they raise the very devil of a noise over causes and remedies, exhorting the workers to patience all the while, until trade begins to revive, when they make still more noise about our glowing prospects.

The Capitalist Class, with its ownership of the means of wealth-production, its claim to organise industry, and its control of political power, whether it understands the nature of the crisis or not, utterly fails to deal with it. All they can do is to wait for trade to revive, while loudly proclaiming it to be the only solution. They cannot however, escape their responsibility in that way, because the workers are beginning to see that their poverty is not due to lack of means and nature-given materials. If Capitalism, as a system, therefore, is incapable of organising except on the basis of short periods of feverish production interspersed with long years of depression, sooner or later the workers will get tired of excuses and promised reforms and will give their minds to a serious study of Socialism. It is quite plain, among other things, that while Capitalism continues, unemployment, and consequently Working Class conditions generally, must become worse; that only by the abolition of Capitalism and the establishment of a system based on production for use, can the workers' conditions be improved; that the Capitalist Class, although unable to alleviate the growing misery, will stoop to any crime in order to maintain the system and their domination over the workers. Socialism makes these facts plain—proves them conclusively—and points to the obvious deduction, the workers must organise to establish the new order for them, in spite of all opposition from the Capitalist Class.

The ruling class sits tight over the means of wealth-production, surrounded by armed forces, and it will not allow them to be used unless they can see profits accruing to them by the process. Such a situation must already appeal to millions of workers as ludicrous. The bulk of human society, held at bay by a relatively small class who live in luxury and idleness and regard it as a favour bestowed when they permit a propertyless human being to work and produce more wealth for them in return for his keep.

This is the actual basis of Capitalist society, the class ownership of the means of life and production for profit. The workers can only live by selling their labour-power; becoming wage-slaves to the master-class. By this means they are robbed of all the wealth they produce beyond what is necessary to keep them fit for work. It is to their interest, therefore, to understand this position and organise upon the basis of their class in order to put an end to Capitalism and establish a system where freely associating men and women will produce for use instead of for Capitalist profit.

Such an organisation will be antagonistic to all Capitalist parties and will recognise the genuine Working Class parties of other lands by the similarity of their principles. They will thus march forward in a real international to capture political power in every country and wipe out the system that denies them the use of the land and means of production for the satisfaction of their material needs.

By such principles the workers will also judge those who profess to lead them. They can safely repudiate the advice of those who tell them to work harder in order to capture foreign markets, because such a course can only benefit the Capitalist. Birds of a feather invariably croak on the same notes.

We cannot, therefore, mistake the friends of the Capitalist even when they label themselves "Labour."

£1000 Fund. (1921)

Party News from the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Brief Exposition of Socialist Theory. (Continued.) (1921)

From the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

Link to Part 7.

VALUE—continued.

The last article under the above heading appeared in the Socialist Standard of December, 1920. The long interruption in the series was due to circumstances out of the control of the writer.

In the article referred to, we commenced the discussion of the theory of value; the following is a summary of the conclusions arrived at :

  Economic wealth is the result of human energy applied to the materials provided by nature.

  The wealth of to-day appears as a multitude of useful articles for sale—commodities.

  A commodity is a useful article (not to the producer, but to the potential buyer) produced for sale.

  The uses of such an article are as many as the human wants it can satisfy ; but these uses have no connection with its value.

  The value of an article is something contained in it that is only expressed in exchange. Absolute value cannot be expressed, only relative value.

  The only common property of all commodities, apart from their physical properties, is their property of being the product of human energy.

   All commodities represent certain proportions of simple human energy.

   Human energy is measured by time.

  The value of a commodity is measured by its cost of reproduction in human labour time— the time simple human energy would occupy in reproducing it.

The conclusion that the value of an article is determined by the amount of socially necessary labour contained in it, gives us the key to the apparent mystery of commodities. At the bottom, commodities represent the relation of the labour of one man, or group of men, to that of another man, or group of men; this relation becomes mysterious, simply because it appears before our eyes as a relation between two articles. In other words, at the back of the expression of value lies the relation between different methods of expending human energy.

The next point we have to consider is the double-sided nature of the labour contained in commodities. On this point Marx wrote as follows :

"I was the first to point out and to examine critically this twofold nature of the labour contained in commodities. As this point is the pivot on which a clear comprehension of political economy turns, we must go more into detail."

We have seen that a commodity is a useful article and a value; and that the latter is determined bv the amount of labour-power required to reproduce such an article. But just as an article must be looked at from two points of view, so also must the labour contained in it. For example, the labour incorporated in a commodity appears on the one side as the work of a baker, a shoemaker, an engineer, and so forth. That is to say, labour of a particular kind or quality, labour that produces a particular kind of article. But on the other side it appears just as the simple expenditure of human energy—getting tired. All its particular physical characteristics are abstracted and it is viewed as the normal activity of the human organism.

If, therefore, taking for illustration the simple exchange of one article for another, we say : 

l pair of boots = 1 hat,

we are simply stating that the same general substance—human energy—exists in the same quantity on each side of this statement or equation.

On the one hand, therefore, we have concrete or useful labour; on the other hand, abstract or value-creating labour. We look at one from the point of view of quality— the kind of labour (baking, engineering, etc.), we look at the other from the point of view of quantity—the amount of labour; the unifying point is the fact that labour of different qualities is, at the bottom, the simple expenditure of human energy.

From the above it will be seen that labour expressed in value has different attributes from labour as a producer of use-value. This enables us to understand another point around which there is a considerable amount of confusion.

At a first glance it would appear that an increase in the quantity of articles produced would necessarily result in an increase in value—more articles, more value. If we examine the matter closely, in connection with what we have already learnt of the twofold nature of labour, we will see that the above statement is not correct.

Suppose a method of producing boots was discovered whereby two pairs of boots could now be produced with the expenditure of the same amount of energy as it formerly took to produce one pair; we would now have two pairs of boots instead of one (an increase in material wealth), but the same quantity of value is contained in the increased amount of wealth as was formerly contained in the smaller amount. This illustration shows the necessity of understanding the twofold nature of labour contained in commodities.

As different commodities are the products of different kinds of labour, commodity production—Capitalism—could not come into existence until the method of expending human labour power had reached the point where it was split up into a multitude of different kinds carried on independently of each other. To put the case another way : Before the exchange of products in the form of commodities can exist as a social basis, the labour of society must have become sectionalised in such a manner that human energy is expended in different ways, each way being carried on independently and for the account of private individuals; there must have arisen a social division of labour. This naturally follows when we remember that, in bringing two different commodities upon the market to exchange for each other, we are in reality exchanging two different kinds of labour. There would be no point in exchanging one hat for another of exactly the same description, i.e., the labour of a hatter for the labour of a hatter. From this fact it follows that while we can have the social division of labour (as in primitive societies) without commodity production, we cannot have commodity production without the social division of labour.

The value of a commodity represents the expenditure of human labour in general, but this simple labour is generally expended under the cloak of labour of different degrees of skill. Skilled labour in essence is more intensified simple labour—a given quantity of skilled labour is equal to a greater quantity of simple labour.

In the process of commodity production all kinds of labour—no matter what the degree of skill may be—are reduced to the simple expenditure of human energy. This reduction of skilled labour to simple labour is not done openly or consciously—as Marx puts it :

"The different proportions in which different sorts of labour are reduced to unskilled labour as their standard are established by a social process that goes on behind the backs of the producers, and, consequently, appear to be fixed by custom."

A good illustration of the point with which we are dealing was provided in the Whistler versus Ruskin case some years ago.

In the course of the action, one of Whistler's pictures (the subject of the action, the "Nocturne in Black and Gold") came up for discussion. This picture had been exhibited at a gallery and marked two hundred guineas. After Whistler had informed the Attorney-General that, altogether, he had only been two days working upon it, the latter asked : "Oh, two days ! The labour of two days, then, is that for which you ask two hundred guineas !" To this Whistler replied: "No; I ask it for the knowledge of a lifetime."

The above puts the case in a nutshell. Highly skilled labour is the result of the expenditure of energy in the past to make it skilful—it is more intensified labour—a multiple of simple energy.

Gilmac.

(To be continued.)

Out of their own mouths are they convicted. (1921)

From the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

"Reynolds's" (4/9/21) publishes the following :

BISHOP ON WORKERS' UNREST. 

"A reporter in Edinburgh complimented the Prime Minister a few days ago upon his attendance at Divine Service morning and evening in that famous city," said Bishop Weldon in the course of an interview. "I am one who cannot but look with regret on the growing laxity in the observance of Sunday. 

"In country houses the Sunday is sadly often devoted to golf and tennis. The oblivion of God in society is responsible in no slight measure for the spirit of unrest in the working classes. The rich are always few, the poor are many; but if it is made evident to the poor that the rich have forfeited their belief in God and the future life, then it is as certain as any event can be, that the poor will claim a predominant share in the good things of this life as compensation for the loss of the hope which once centred in the life after death," etc., etc.

G. H.

Constitutionalism. (1921)

From the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

When the Socialist Party says that it is correct to observe the constitutional rules laid down by the political powers of the capitalist class, that band of revolutionary cheap-jacks and super-opportunists calling themselves Communists tell us we are treading the wrong path

They endeavour to prove that a working class party must conduct its fight for supremacy in accordance with rules of its own; that it is futile and waste of time thinking that the ruling class will permit its subject class—the workers—to vote them out of power. Of course, this sounds very heroic and is on a par with the loud-mouthed utterances of all the big men in the Labour movement, who profit by shouting red-hot phrases. Their motto is to make plenty of noise, attract the support of the rank and file, and wax fat on the coppers which they are able to extract from their dupes. We are not surprised, therefore, that an organisation like the Communist Party display inconsistency at times. For example, we notice that during the last few weeks they have acknowledged the necessity of adopting constitutional action. For example, the Edinburgh Branch of the Communist Party applied to the local magistrates recently for permission to organise a badge day on behalf of the Russian Famine Fund. Permission was refused. But fancy asking the powers that be for their permission !

Further, at the Caerphilly Bye-Election they put up a representative, and in so doing were necessarily compelled to observe the legal procedure of the political power of organised constitutional capitalism, i.e., the necessary deposit had to be made according to the law, before a candidate can enter the political arena, no matter what party he represents. It is interesting to read the report of the Communist Party on the result of the Caerphilly Election. The writer spills much ink describing the eleventh-hour stunts resorted to in order to convince the workers of the truths of Communism.

The wild spontaneous raids which are made by political parties at election times are quite the usual thing, and law and order winks at many of the escapades indulged in by the political parties and their followers on these occasions. And once more the Communist Party in quite the orthodox manner endeavoured to out-stunt all the other electioneering stunt specialists.

Men and women are not convinced of the principles of a political policy such as the Socialist Party holds, in five minutes. This is another instance to show that the Communist Party is a confusionist organisation. It adopts all the orthodox methods and tricks of the trade of the political profiteer, endeavouring to ride into office with a few revolutionary war-cries, upon the backs of an ignorant following. Let the workers make the most of their opportunity to become acquainted with Marxian theories ; not until they understand them will they be able to take sound action. When that time comes the howls of the revolutionary opportunists of the Communist Party brand will pass unheeded.

D. C. J.

Unemployment. Tragedy or Farce? (1921)

From the October 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

Notwithstanding the claim, advanced by the daily press, that trade shows signs of revival, the unemployed figures are still in the neighbourhood of 1½  millions. A writer in The Observer, described as an expert and a member of Lord Saint David's Committee, says : "The crisis is a real one, and doubts if any responsible leader in industry would maintain that the volume of available employment in this country can be increased to any appreciable extent before next June." Another paper—The Sunday Pictorial, September 4th—says that the official figures on unemployment are misleading, because they take no account of those who have exhausted their unemployed pay, a body that grows in numbers every week. The Daily Chronicle, September 6th, gives the number of unemployed in the United States as six millions. In Russia and Austria, we are told, millions are actually starving. In fact, the workers of every country are unemployed to an extent never yet experienced, with one exception. We are told that Germany is the exception, and that unemployment there is scarcely known. If this is true, it is not the first time that the workers of a losing country in a great war have been better off than the victors. The same thing was noticed after the Franco-Prussian war in 1871. Some people might argue from this that the way to fuller employment for any country was to have a good war with a neighbouring country and lose it !

Such an argument, however, is on a par with the general capitalist principle that working-class prosperity in one country can only be built up on the unemployment and impoverishment of the workers of other countries. That is necessarily the outcome of the capitalist contention that unemployment can only be reduced by the capture of foreign trade. During the war the capitalist press insisted on the capture of the enemy's trade in various directions, and, boasting continuously that it was a business war, prophesied greater prosperity for British capitalists and workers as the result of victory. But their prophesy was falsified, and the only fact that has been demonstrated is that the abnormal prosperity of any one country can only occur when other countries fall behind in the race for markets.

In normal times unemployment is fairly evenly spread over all capitalist countries, partly because depressions, when they come, affect them all, and partly because workers are attracted to those countries where trade is on the increase. The passage of workers from one country to another is facilitated by capitalist governments because a large army of unemployed insures cheap labour-power to the capitalist, who can sell his commodities cheaper than his foreign competitors with no reduction in his profits. But cheap labour-power to the capitalist means a lower standard of living to the workers. We thus see that the capitalist remedy for unemployment—capture foreign trade—is a delusion for the workers, because its application means worse conditions for themselves and increased unemployment for their fellow-workers abroad.

No single country can find a solution to the unemployed problem. It is a question that affects the workers of every capitalist country equally. The solution must, therefore, be one that can be applied all round ; it must be universal. Now, Socialism is international. As a remedy for unemployment it must be applied universally, and because it fulfils that condition should take precedence in the workers' consideration. Before examining the full claims of Socialism on the workers' attention, it might be interesting to glance at some of the suggested remedies, the hypocritical platitudes and solemn warnings of our masters and their agents. When facing a question of such magnitude, every suggested remedy should be carefully examined before being discarded or adopted.

At first sight unemployment insurance appears to many to be a remedy. Many who think so only find out their mistake when they have exhausted their unemployed pay and have failed to find a situation. Others find out their mistake in trying to live on it. But insurance cannot even be accepted as a suggested remedy, because it does not pretend to reduce unemployment. All that it does is to keep some workers from actually starving until the capitalist wants them back in the factory again. The Daily Chronicle (September 14th, 1921) contends that it is the best and the cheapest method of dealing with the problem. Referring to the immense volume of unemployment, they say that "it has been accompanied by singularly little acute distress or violent discontent." "Acute distress" for the Chronicle might mean any stage in the starvation process down to actual skin and bones, but there is no mistake about the satisfaction it feels that there has been little "violent discontent." Another item that gives satisfaction to the Chronicle is the fact that "by far the greater part of the 'doles' financial cost will be eventually recouped by the State from the contributions of employers and employed."

The chief advantage of insurance for the capitalists is that it is elastic in its application. It can be extended or reduced, in time or amount, to suit the severity of the trade crisis through which they happen to be passing. The Chronicle says that "it is the most scientific policy that any State has adopted. As compared with relief works, it covers much more fully the actual field of distress, while it also entails far less outlay." But the controversy over the relative values of the "doles" or relief works need worry the worker but little. Both will be applied while the crisis lasts and discontinued as soon as it is over. The return of normal trade conditions, while it solves the problem for the capitalists at the moment, still leaves immense numbers unemployed, which increase with every such crisis.

In his presidential address to the Trade Union Congress, Mr. Poulton fell foul of several capitalist papers. Among many other things he said of little or no importance, was the outstanding declaration "that the facilities for producing goods were never more abundant or more efficient than to-day, enabling enormous quantities to be produced at very short notice. This, in its turn, whatever economists might say, had the effect of throwing out of employment multitudes of workers. It was no wonder that we heard at times of workers restricting output." (Chronicle, September 6th, 1921).

Mr. Poulton's remedy is to shorten the working week. But this, like the dole, is no remedy. With an 8-hour working day, the United States is no better than other countries, either in normal times or during the present crisis. If one country alone adopts this measure it inevitably falls behind in the race for markets, unless greater efficiency is exacted from its workers or more up-to-date methods and machinery introduced, or both. It is a well-known fact that American workers gain nothing by their shorter working day. The pace at which they work makes them cheap when compared with European workers.

On the other hand, a universally applied shorter week must remain the dream of impossiblists. Capitalist groups are too deeply engrossed in the struggle for markets to come to a common agreement among themselves on a question that might give the workers more time to think about and discuss their slavery and the way to escape from it. While if the workers were sufficiently united internationally and powerful enough to enforce a universally shorter week, they would be powerful enough to completely overthrow capitalism and establish Socialism.

So much for Mr. Poulton's suggestion. Now for the other capitalist agents of whom he fell foul. The Daily Chronicle, September 6th, 1921, refers to it as "the old blind idea that there is only a fixed amount of work to be done in the world, and that therefore the less one man does in return for his wages, the more there will be for others to do . . . He ought to know that the amount of work available in the world tends to be diminished by every increase in the costs of production; and therefore that reduction of hours, however desirable it may from time to time be on other grounds, must in relation to unemployment normally exert a bad and not a good influence."

The latter part of this statement is entirely false. An increase in the costs of production which affected the world would make no difference whatever in the amount produced, other things remaining as they were. All that would happen would be that higher prices would rule all round. Goods would have their money name changed, including labour-power. Even this need not happen as a result of a shorter working week or higher wages. Under such circumstances competition might not permit capitalists to raise prices, in which case the workers would obviously be encroaching on profits, if the increased cost of production were due to higher wages.

Apart from this, however, it is only when one set of capitalists are faced with a rise in the cost of production, and are unable to compete in the open market, that they are forced to curtail or stop production. The proof of this is seen when we compare two countries like Spain and the United States. The former is a century behind the latter industrially, because it has never adopted to the same extent cheap and efficient methods of production. Yet America, with all its efficiency and cheapness—the qualities that exert a good influence on employment, according to the Chronicle—surpasses every other nation in the numbers of its unemployed.

This brings us to the "old blind idea" of the Chronicle. If low costs of production give more, instead of less employment, why do American factories periodically close down, stopping production while they unload their goods on the market? Why does every country do the same? Not because "there is only a fixed amount of work to be done in the world"—a phrase which only an ignoramus in economics would use —but because within a given period the demand for goods will be limited, if not by the needs of the people, by their ability to pay for them. In the next period the demand may be higher, or lower, but the outstanding fact is that the world's workers with modern means can always meet that demand with millions of idle days to spare. Days of unemployment without wages spread over the working-class. Under a sane system of society, where production was carried on for use, instead of for capitalist profits, they would be days of rest or recreation.

The Chronicle was not the only paper that chastised Mr. Poulton for his suggestion. The Sunday Pictorial (September 11th, 1921) took a different line. One of its writers jeered at him because he "advised the workers to press for a shorter week," and then went on to say "that the needs of the world were under-supplied." This deep thinking agent of capitalism then asked, "How is the supply of things needed by the world to be increased by diminution of the hours spent in making them?" Let him ask any one of the millions of unemployed. They have hands and brains. Why are they idle if the world is under-supplied ? Because it is not the needs of the world that determines the quantity of goods to be produced. The capitalist calls a halt when he can no longer sell at a profit. Or, to be strictly accurate, he only allows production to proceed when he receives orders that will enable him to realise profits. The Sunday Pictorial writer must be a first-class nincompoop if he thinks that it takes all the world's workers all their time either to meet the effective demand or satisfy the world's needs—two very different things. The fact that the world's markets are periodically glutted in normal times, and millions unemployed, with further millions working short time and many millions of days lost through industrial disputes, together with an enormous section of the population engaged in unproductive work, proves the contrary.

With modern machinery and methods, only a small proportion of the workers would be needed for actual production if kept continuously at work.

The biggest mistake made by the workers lies in their willingness to be led, instead of studying and discussing the question among themselves, whether in or out of work. All workers are subject to unemployment. No job under capitalism is sure ; consequently unemployment is the concern of every worker.

There are always plenty of unscrupulous or mad-brained adventurers ready to pose as leaders where a number of people have a grievance. But even if they belong to the ranks of the aggrieved, it does not follow that they are to be trusted as leaders. At Liverpool the Rev. J. Vint Laughland advised the workless to capture the Art Gallery and led the attack personally. They captured the Art Gallery all right, but it proved to be a trap. The doors were closed, and in the words of an eye-witness, reported in the Daily Chronicle, September 13th, 1921 : "A vestibule was crammed with men, who one after another went down under the blows of the constables' batons," and "a stream of injured men were led out or carried away on stretchers ; while many more were led from the building in batches, and taken to the police station in vans under escort."

In Poplar, as in other districts of London where Labour councillors find themselves unable to fulfil their election pledges, they are confusing the issue by dragging in the question of rates equalisation, which is not the concern of the workers at all, but purely a question for the capitalists who own property in the different districts.

The Observer (September 24th, 1921) says that : "The real and permanent cure for the ills of Poplar, and other poor and populous districts now in like case, was, is and will remain the discovery of the essentials for co-operation among those engaged in production." In other words, those who have the luck to be employed must agree to terms that are acceptable to employers, and the unemployed—not being engaged in production—may be safely ignored.

Read where we may, in Capitalist or Labour journals, there has never yet been brought forward any scheme that can cure unemployment. Some boasted remedies, like co-partnership and guild-production, only aggravate the evil. Others, like insurance and relief works, do not affect it at all. In regard to the latter, The Observer (September 18th, 1921) says: "They must not compete with the legitimate opportunities of employment that trade will present as it recovers." When the capitalist wants workers to exploit, there must be plenty of unemployed in order that he may get them cheap. Equalisation of rates is a confusionist cry. A shorter week may or may not reduce unemployment. Electrification schemes, forestry, reclamation of foreshores, and widening of roads are things that capitalist governments may want but dare not undertake because of the outcry against the necessary taxation or the interference with private enterprise. Capitalist governments are bankrupt in ideas to cope with the question. Their agents, political and industrial, religious or patriotic, and sympathetic or unsympathetic with the workers, are only concerned with their private ambitions. Sooner or later the workers will be forced to recognise these facts, and in increasing numbers will focus their minds on the question for themselves. Others will come into contact with genuine Socialist works and workers, and will be convinced that unemployment is the inevitable product of a system in which a small class owns the means of wealth production, and imposes upon the rest of society the necessity of selling their energy as a commodity, in order to obtain the necessaries of life.

Without this knowledge the workers are the slaves of the employing class. With the knowledge lies their hope of emancipation. Determined to organise and act on their knowledge, they can, by first dispossessing the employing class of the means of wealth production, and secondly by making them the common property of society, to be used by all for the common needs, and controlled by all through the democratic administrations they deem it necessary to set up, realise their freedom and satisfy all their needs as freely associating men and women.

F. Foan

"Higher Prices Mean Fewer Jobs." (1921)

From the October 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

J. A. R. Marriott, M.P., on Unemployment

Mr. Marriott has been offering a solution for the problem of unemployment, and the headline quoted above from the Evening News (September 13th) is the text he uses.

His article is more moderate in tone, and contains a larger measure of truth and accurate observation than one expects to find nowadays among those newspapers described as "competent to write authoritatively." He starts by making what must necessarily be for his readers a serious and distinctly unusual admission about industrial crises like the present : "Such crises have recurred at more or less regular intervals during the last century and a quarter," but he believes, in spite of this, "that the overthrow of the existing order would involve us in far more acute and general distress than anything we are likely to suffer during the difficult months ahead."

There is more truth in that last remark than Mr. Marriott thought, and I agree that for him it is not an unreasonable statement; but it is necessary to have clearly in mind to whom that "we" refers. "We," the comfortable and leisured class to which Mr. Marriott belongs, are not suffering from the prevailing unemployment, "we" never have so suffered, and, whoever else does, "we" shall see to it that "we" never do. But what of the future ? If capitalism is overthrown, what happens to "us" and our privileged position ? Is it not enough to make the most open-minded of the capitalist economists pause when they find the direction in which their investigations are leading them ; to make them turn back from the path to the future which the workers alone can follow, and announce that the existing system is the sublime height of mankind's upward progress. "After us the deluge" ?

"What, then, is the cause of the phenomenon of recurrent unemployment, and what is the appropriate remedy ?" Mr. Marriott dismisses off-hand the "glib answer of the Communists" that capitalism is the cause, and work or full maintenance, and the immediate abolition of the system, the ultimate remedy.

He admits that crises are "the concomitant of the new order in industry initiated by the industrial revolution," and that unemployment is "an incident—perhaps an inevitable incident—of large-scale production for a world market" ; but this, he says, is not capitalism. I would like then to ask what was the "new order initiated by the industrial revolution" ? What was it if not modern capitalism ? Where can Mr. Marriott find an instance of "large-scale production for the world market" except under capitalism?

Although Mr. Marriott cannot face his own conclusions, he admits our case in its entirety. Unemployment is part, and an essential part of the system under which we live. He even goes so far as to speak of "that reserve of labour upon which the periodic prosperity of an industry is dependent." It is, in fact, just because Mr. Marriott cannot help but recognise, as we do, that capitalism and unemployment are inseparable, that he does not even claim to have found the solution he set out to discover.

The utmost he can do is to suggest the speediest and least difficult way out of the present state of stagnation, without touching what he himself admits to be the real problem, the recurring crises.

Again, he tells us that prior to the present era chronic unemployment was unknown. Why, then, must we acknowledge our impotence to escape an alleged "inexorable economic law" which had no terrors for our ancestors of some hundreds of years ago ? Are we patiently to accept starvation for our class, knowing as we do that our powers of wealth production are a hundred times greater than then, just because of the class-biassed economic theories of Mr. Marriott ?

"So long as countries were self-supporting in agriculture and industry, crises occurred only at rare intervals, being the outcome of pestilence or famine, or some great upheaval in the natural world." Poverty is no longer the result of natural phenomena; it is a product of society itself, of artificially restricted production, and unequal distribution of the product.

Mr. Marriott criticises the "Communists" for wanting to return to pre-capitalist conditions, but does not give evidence that they ever propagated such an absurdity. Anyhow, we know, and Mr. Marriott knows, that it cannot be done.

The case Mr. Marriott has to meet is this. He admits the existence in the recent past of a form of social organisation to which unemployment was unknown; he admits also the enormous increase of productivity since the inception of modern capitalism. What, then, is the factor, or what even is the kind of factor, which prohibits production for use instead of for private profit ?

In further criticism of the "Communists" he cites the experience of Louis Blanc in 1848 with his "national workshops" and the application of the theory of "the right to work." He rightly says the provision of full maintenance for the unemployed is incompatible with the continuance of capitalism. Louis Blanc learned by experience what everyone now knows to be true. But here, again, Mr. Marriott might observe that the "Communist Party" have explicitly conceded the impossibility of their demand being met; it would mean "suicide for the capitalist class." Incidentally, it illustrates the dangerous tendency of "Communist Party" propaganda that the uninstructed sympathy of the unemployed should be gained by promises incapable of fulfilment.

Now we come to Mr. Marriott's remedy. It is that the wages of those still in work must be lowered. Lower wages—lower prices—more foreign trade—work for the unemployed.

It looks sound, but the chain has weak links. Firstly, lower wages mean not lower prices, but higher profits; and, secondly, this solution, if otherwise genuine, can only help one country at the expense of others. Can that be a solution for a problem of world-wide magnitude ? There is no corner of the capitalist earth immune from the effects of industrial, commercial, and financial depression.

The argument that the workers must accept less wages to enable their employers to compete with the sweating "foreign" manufacturer is used in every country in the world, unfortunately with some effect. But has anyone ever heard of an employers' association which proposed to deal with such a situation by assisting the unfortunate foreign worker to organise and improve his status ? No, because the capitalist will always sell his goods at the maximum the market will bear, and he knows that the paying of a wage higher than he can compel his employees to accept is a dead loss to him, a subtraction from his profits.

True, prices must come down, for the simple and sufficient reason that stocks in hands are great and the owners cannot all wait indefinitely for an increased demand. They want ready money, and must sell at a reduction, at a loss even. Every penny, therefore, they can knock off their labour costs is a clear gain to them. Hence Mr. Marriott's anxiety on behalf of the capitalist class to persuade the out-of-work that his enemy is the employed man who stands out against wage cuts. In conclusion, as
against Mr. Marriott's dicta that "the utmost the workless can claim is subsistence," and that "those in work must be content with something not much above that level," our advice is, that while capitalism lasts, the workers, whatever their condition, in work or out, will get, and will be entitled to, just as much as they can compel the capitalist class to give them. It is to be hoped that they will soon become so dissatisfied with their meagre portion that they will join us in getting the whole
lot, the earth.

Edgar Hardcastle

£1000 Fund. (1921)

Party News from the October 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

Where Russia Stands. (1921)

From the October 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

Link to Part 3.

Earlier in this series of articles we promised to examine more closely the oft-repeated assertion that the Russian Bolsheviks were carrying further, and in the same spirit, the movement begun by the Paris Communards in March, 1871.

On comparing the Commune with the Bolshevik movement we find that there are fundamental differences between them.

The first (and most important) difference that comes to our notice concerns the method of control. The Commune aimed at, and realised during its short life, control of affairs directly by the whole people; whereas the Bolsheviks aimed at control by a few. It is true the Bolsheviks, in some of their proclamations, have made it appear that the Russian masses were in control, but we have already supplied abundant evidence through these columns illustrating how different the actuality is from the appearance. In order to bring the Bolshevik position on this question clearly to mind again, we submit the following further illustration:

  Nevertheless, we do not for a moment deny that our apparatus is rigidly centralised ; that our policy towards the bourgeoisie and towards the parties of the compromising Socialists is repressive in character; that the organisation of our own Party, as a ruling Party which exercises a dictatorship through the Soviets, is of a militarist type. —(“The Dictatorship of the Proletariat in Russia,” by N. Bucharin in the Workers Dreadnought, 4/12/1920).

Such, is the Bolshevik position—the antithesis of control by the masses.

What was the attitude of the Commune on this question ? Let us permit Engels to give his evidence first.

In his introduction to the German edition of the Civil War in France (see The Paris Commune, NewYork Labour News Co.), Engels points out that :

 The members of the Commune were divided into a majority of Blanquists, who had also predominated in the central committee of the National Guard, and a minority, which consisted for the most part of members of the International Working Men’s Association, who were adherents of the Proudhonian School of Socialism.

He then shows that both the Blanquists and Proudhonists did the very reverse of that which the doctrines of their school proscribed . Of the Blanquists he writes as follows:

  The Blanquists fared no better. Brought up in the school of conspiracy, held together by the rigid discipline essential to it, they started from the conception that a comparatively small number of resolute, well-organised men would be able not only to grasp the helm of State at a favourable moment, but also, through the display of great energy and reckless daring, to hold it as long as required, that is, until they had succeeded in carrying the masses of the people into the revolutionary current and ranging them round the small leading band. To accomplish this, what was necessary, above all else, was the most stringent, dictatorial centralisation of all powers in the hands of the new revolutionary government. And what did the Commune do, which in the majority consisted of these very Blanquists? In all its proclamations to the French people in the provinces it called upon them for a free federation of all French communes with Paris for a national organisation, which, for the first time, was to be the real creation of the nation. The army, the political police, the bureaucracy, all those agencies of oppression in a centralised government, which Napoleon had created in 1798, and which since then every new government had gladly used and kept up as ready weapons against its enemies, were to be abolished everywhere, as they had been abolished in Paris. —Page 16.

Lenin repeatedly cries out against the charge of “Blanquism” levelled at his group, and asserts “We are not Blanquists,” yet it is obvious that Engels’ description of the French Blanquists exactly fits the Bolsheviks.

We have previously quoted Zinovief‘s statement that the Russian Communist Party controls the State machine from top to bottom, though the membership of this Party was only a little over 600,000 in April, 1920, some of whom were excluded from voting. Taking Zinovief’s statement with that of Bucharin, quoted above, what is the difference between the Russian party and the Blanquists as defined by Engels? Only this. The Bolshevists are Blanquists in practice, whilst the Blanquists acted directly opposite to the Blanquist idea.

Now let us hear what Lissagaray, the historian of the Commune, has to say.

Of the Central Committee, the committee appointed by the National Guard prior to the promulgation of the Commune, he writes as follows :

  Their farewell address was worthy of their advent : “Do not forget that the men who will serve you best are those whom you will choose from amongst yourselves, living your life, suffering the same ills. Beware of the ambitious as well as the upstarts. Beware also of mere talkers. Shun those whom fortune has favoured, for only too rarely is he who possesses fortune prone to look upon the workingman as a brother. Give your preference to those who do not solicit your suffrages. True merit is modest, and it is for the workingmen to know those who are worthy, not for these to present themselves.
  They could indeed “come down the steps of the Hotel de Ville head erect,” these obscure men who had safely anchored the revolution of the 18th March. Named only to organise the National Guard, thrown at the head of a revolution without precedent and without guides, they had been able to resist the impatient, quell the riot, re-establish the public services, victual Paris, baffle intrigues, take advantage of all blunders of Versailles and of the Mayors, and, harassed on all sides, every moment in danger of civil war, know how to negotiate, to act at the right time and in the right place. They had embodied the tendency of the movement, limited their program to communal revindications, and conducted the entire population to the ballot-box.” —Page 124.

The Central Committee referred to by Lissagaray was composed of delegates appointed by the National Guard. The latter body comprised the able-bodied citizens of Paris after the departure of the Versaillese. The delegates in question were none of them appointed as members of any particular group or party; all were, as, Lissagaray repeatedly emphasises, unknown, obscure men, who voluntarily relinquished the power they held as soon as they had arranged for, and carried through, the elections of the delegates to the Commune itself.

The Bolshevik movement is the attempt at dictatorship on the part of a group within the Russian Communist Party. The Paris Commune, on the contrary, was no dictatorship of a party or group, but an endeavour to realise the participation of the whole of the people democratically in the administration of social affairs.

Much has been written by the Bolsheviks and their supporters around the question of freedom of the Press; volumes of ridicule and abuse have been poured upon the heads of those unfortunates who opposed the suppression of the bourgeois press, or who suggested that there was no point in gagging the press if the Russian masses were sufficiently advanced to understand the position. It must be borne in mind that the Bolsheviks make great capital out of the alleged overwhelming support they received from the workers, soldiers and peasants.

What did the Communards do (with no precedent to assist them) in this connection when faced by a position similar to that facing the Bolsheviks? Let us hear Lissagaray again :

  Sunday the 26th (March, 1871) was a day of joy and sunshine. Paris breathed again, happy, like one just escaped from death or great peril. At Versailles the streets looked gloomy, gendarmes occupied the station, brutally demanded passports, confiscated all the journals of Paris, and at the slightest expression of sympathy for the town arrested you. At Paris everybody could enter freely. The streets swarmed with people, the cafes were noisy ; the same lad cried out the Paris Journal and the Commune ; the attacks against the Hotel de Ville, the protestations of a few malcontents, were posted on the walls by the side of the placards of the Central Committee. The people were without anger because without fear. The voting paper had replaced the Chassepot.— Page 172.

From the above it will be seen that the statements of the Bourgeois were circulated as freely and openly as the statements of the Communards—exactly the opposite of the procedure in Russia. The Bolsheviks suppressed antagonistic journals; put into operation a “Committee of Public Safety” against their adversaries; demolished the Assembly that had been one of their watchwords ; put into operation labour and military conscription; and, in general, ruled with a mailed fist.

The Bolsheviks claim that the working class must break up the capitalist state machine as a preliminary step to the social revolution. On this question they make excessive use of Marx’s phrase, from the Civil War in France, the “working class cannot simply seize the available ready-machinery of the State and set it going for its own ends.” We have already dealt with this point, but a little further examination of it will be useful, particularly as Lenin employs several pages of his The State and Revolution to force an unwarrantable inference from Marx’s words.

In the first place, what constitutes a social revolution? A social revolution goes through three phases : First the educational and agitational phase; then the conquest of power; and finally the reorganisation of society to meet the requirements of the class just arisen to power.

Marx analysed the Commune and showed that once in power (that is to say, having reached the second phase) the Communards provided an illustration of the methods to be adopted by the workers to accomplish the revolution in conditions; that stopping at the mere laying hold “of the ready-made State machinery” would not solve their difficulties; but he nowhere suggests that the workers should abstain from, in the first instance, obtaining control of this machinery. Engels makes the matter quite clear when he says, in the Introduction to the Civil War in France (already quoted) :

  From the very outset the Commune had to recognise that the working-class, having once attained supremacy in the State, could not work with the old machinery of government.  (Italics ours.)— Page 17.

It is necessary to use the evidence of the Commune very carefully in this connection, because at the time a peculiar position had arisen. The French Bourgeoisie had already divested themselves of the greater part of their power by their intrigues and manipulations with Germany. In fact, in order to fight the Commune they had to beg of Bismarck the release of the French soldiers interned in Germany. The general in charge of the operations against the Commune was the same MacMahon who had “sold out” at Sedan.

The break-up of the capitalist State machinery may be a preliminary step to the revolution in social conditions, but it certainly is not a preliminary step to the conquest of power. The Bolsheviks, when blinding themselves with “the break up of the State machinery ” infer that this machinery must be “smashed ” before power can be obtained (it is true they frequently contradict themselves, as we have shown elsewhere), hence their contention that strikes and street insurrections are the main methods of action. For example, in the Socialist Review for July, 1920, there appears a translation of an official document entitled “Parliamentarism and the Struggle for the Soviets.” The following paragraph from this document makes clear the Bolshevik attitude :

  What we would particularly emphasise is the following : The real solution of the question is to be found, under all circumstances, outside Parliament, in the street. That strikes and insurrections are the only methods of resolute war between Capital and Labour is now clear. Therefore, the chief efforts of comrades should be directed to the work of the mobilisation of the masses, the establishment of the Party, the development of its own groups in industry and their control over it, the organisation of Soviets during the course of the struggle, the leading of mass action, agitation for the revolution among the masses—all that in the first line ; Parliamentary action and participation in election campaigns only as one expedient in this work—nothing more ” (Italics ours.)—Page 272.

The above document is signed “G. Zinoviev, President of the Executive Committee of the Communist International,” and dated September 1st, 1919. It must be remembered that Lenin is a leading member of the E.C. of the Communist International.

Many further illustrations could be given, but the above is sufficient to indicate what a subordinate position is given to parliamentary action by the Bolsheviks.

To those who refuse to be carried away by mere verbiage, it must be obvious that to attempt to smash the political machinery, without first getting hold of it, is the best way for the workers to get their heads smashed. If they first get hold of the political machinery (which they can do when the majority so wish) they can then, as Engels puts it, lop off its worst features at once. Engels’ statement, anent the State, made in 1891, is as follows :

  But in reality the State is nothing else than a machine for the oppression of one class by another class, and that no less so in the democratic republic than under the monarchy. At the very best it is an inheritance of evil bound to be transmitted to the proletariat when it has become victorious in its struggle for class supremacy, and the worst features of which it will have to lop off at once, as the Commune did, until a new race, grown up under new, free social conditions, will be in a position to shake off from itself this state rubbish in its entirety. —Page 20. Introd. to German ed. Civil War in France. (Italics ours.)

The above rather brief comparison of the Paris Commune with the Bolshevik movement will convey an idea of the nature of the differences between them.

Before concluding our sketch of the Russian movement there is another point to which we wish to draw attention.

Lenin and other Bolshevik writers frequently contend that they did not base their hopes of success upon an early uprising of the international working class. If we examine their proclamations and the reports of their speeches, however, we find that the contrary is true. The following quotations should set any doubts upon this point at rest :

  If in awaiting the imminent proletarian flood in Europe, Russia should be forced to conclude peace with the present-day Governments of the Central Powers, it would be a provisional, temporary, and transitory peace, with the revision of which the European Revolution will have to concern itself in the first instance. Our whole policy is built upon the expectation of this revolution.” (Italics ours.)—Page 160. From “What is a Peace Programme,” by L. Trotsky. Printed in International Conciliation” (New York, No. 149, April, 1920.)

In the same journal from which the above extract is taken there appears a May 1st Appeal from the Communist International “to the Toilers of the Whole World,” which is signed by the “Executive Committee of the Communist International,”‘ and concludes as follows :

 In 1919 was born the great Communist International.
In 1920 will be born the great International Soviet Republic.—Page 181.

It must be again pointed out that Lenin is a leading member of the Executive that sent out the above appeal, and Zinoviev is the secretary.

In different contributions, Trotzky and others go into ecstacies over the alleged spreading of the Soviet Movement throughout the world. Trotzky, in particular, states (Pravda, April 23rd, 1919) :

  At the present moment one awaits from day to day the victory of the Soviet Republic in Austria and in Germany. 

We are afraid the days are rather long ones, and Trotzky relies too much on wishes and too little on exact information.

However, time will bring the solution to Russian doubts and difficulties, as it has brought the solutions to the problems of the past.

At the present moment nature is playing a tragic part in the business. In ordinary circumstances a drought in Russia is a very serious matter owing to the primitive agricultural methods and the failure of the peasants as a class to make provision for the future. At the present juncture, when a world-wide drought of a particularly severe character has been combined with circumstances due to Bolshevik dictatorship, the results are greatly exasperated and presage disaster to the Bolshevik regime.

This fact, however, is no excuse for jubilation on the part of Bolshevik opponents, nor is the shedding of crocodile tears over the starving peasantry helpful. It should, however, induce the workers—and particularly the self-styled “revolutionists” of the brass band variety—to study the whole of the conditions, so far as information is available, that have given rise to the present state of affairs. By such action they will enlarge their knowledge of principles and tactics, and be capable of taking an understanding part in the struggle for international working class emancipation.

One lesson above all Russia drives home : No backward nation can leap the intermediate stages of development and jump ahead of the vanguard. One nation learns from another, and progress is, on the average, parallel in the advanced countries.

The laws of historical development, which work with an iron-like consistency, are defeating the Bolsheviks more conclusively than any capitalist army.

Gilmac.