The Plot to Educate. Why the Capitalist wants Brains. (1916)

From the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

The clerk and the school-teacher boast that they live by their brains. The mechanic smiles in derision and claims that the real thing worth knowing is, how to do something useful. The capitalist and the slacker regard all kinds of education as worthless that do not help them to dodge work. These are personal view-points and much twaddle has been spoken and written on each, which is responsible for much of the confusion that exists on the subject of education.

The capitalist himself does not want to be troubled with education, as he understands it ; he pays someone else to acquire and use it in his interest. He does not object to some pains to obtain a smattering of general knowledge and that neurotic polish known and worshipped as culture. Some capitalists even pose as business men and indulge in vague generalities about “technical knowledge” and “the qualities that make for success.” These are the merchant princes and the qualities they laud were precisely the ones that made them such. The capitalist who soils his hands, or worries his brains over technicalities, it is almost needless to add, is the man who cannot afford to buy brains and must, perforce, use his own.

Science has become an adjunct of industry. Educated brains are as necessary to the capitalist as skilled hands and muscular are. Industry (read capitalists) needs both. Muscular energy and mechanical skill multiplies itself without much watering and manuring from the owners of capital. But the science of the business laboratory, and the knowledge necessary to organization on a large scale can only be acquired under special circumstances not attainable by the average worker.

There is no question of intelligence involved. The lad of average intellect given the opportunity to qualify could fill any post in the field of industry. There is no genius in evidence, nor is it required. High salaries are paid to the chemist and the organiser because their skill or ability is the product of many workers concentrated in one person. The opportunities to acquire this concentrated knowledge are rare, consequently those who possess it are scarce, their price on the labour market is high and their heads are swollen, not with the exercise of their brains, but with the idea that they are worth more than the mechanic or laboiner—to the capitalist.

And the latter, well, he wants more. Not like the worker who “wants more work in order to get less of it.” The capitalist wants more brain workers to get more—for less money. Hence the agitation in the Press. One writer says: “Germany did not sweep to such triumphs in the chemical world simply on the brains of one or two super-skilled men. She had armies of such men.” The capitalist wants to be quit of the Ramseys, Wallaces and Lodges who flirt with spooks and try to analyse ether. When they condescend to notice him from the heights of the Milky Way, the astral world, or a Park Lane drawing-room, their information was, to say the least, costly.

What the capitalist wants is to instal the brain-worker under his factory roof, with the rest of his workers, where he can see that his brain works—by the results. The first step to this end is to train the men. Supply of brain-workers must overtake demand. As was the case with school-teachers and clerks, competition will assert itself and the capitalist will get what he wants—cheap scientists and brain-workers.

The first move is a move in Parliament—the executive of the capitalists. Two committees are appointed, one for science, the other for languages. The terms of reference and constitution of the first are :

“To enquire into the position occupied by natural science in the educational system of Great Britain, especially in secondary schools and universities ; and to advise what measures are needed to promote its study, regard being had to the requirements of a liberal education, to the advancement of pure science, and to the interests of the trades, industries and professions which particularly depend upon applied science.”

The terms of the second are :

“To enquire into the position occupied by the study of modern languages in the educational system of Great Britain, especially in secondary schools and universities, and to advise what measures are required to promote their study, regard being had to the requirements of a liberal education, including an appreciation of the history, literature and civilisation of other countries and to the interests of commerce and public service”.

The unthinking one who reads the above will see nothing in it but the intention of Parliament to give facilities to the children of the poor to qualify for better jobs ; it entirely escapes his notice that the wholesale manufacture of applicants quickly robs the better job of its advantages. Capitalism by these very methods tends to reduce all workers to one dead level. Mechanical inventions eliminate skilled workers; ; lightning calculators scrap the clerk, and the man of muscle is superseded by magnetic cranes, etc.

Division of labour reduces the knowledge and skill required by each person to a minimum. Every man and woman specialises in one direction only ; and in that direction, because of the competition, must devote all his or her energies. To what end ? “The interests of trade, industry, and commerce.” All the educational roads lead to the same goal—the commercial interests of the capitalist class. If the worker wants to live he must get into one of the ruts provided, where his senses will be sharpened and his very thoughts moulded and curbed in the interest of commerce. Whether he works with his brain or his hands, or with, a combination of both—as, indeed, all forms of labour really are—he is subservient to commerce. Production and distribution, instead of being the means to satisfy his wants, enslaves him, plants him in a niche and keeps him busy with the routine of a department or the feeding of a machine.

Life for the average worker has no meaning outside the interests of commerce. The wonders of the universe, the beauties of nature, real knowledge and culture, are outside his ken : he is a mere cog in the machinery of wealth production—and remains poor. The accumulated knowledge of society built up by successive generations of workers has made possible a full and glorious life for all. Yet the life that comes to each of us but once is forced into a rut of toil that an idle class may flourish and revel in excessive luxury.

We Socialists are often accused of using strong language, but it is difficult to frame language that will convey an adequate idea of the hideous poverty of the great mass of the workers, according even to capitalist evidence. The cupidity and greed of the capitalist and the ignominy of the wage-slave have become ingrained in their respective natures. We Socialists, while not relinquishing the task of presenting to the workers a true perspective of their position, gladly welcome any capitalist writer of ability who contributes anything that will support our position, or help remove seme of the confusion prevalent on the subject of education.

The instructions given to the committee that is to investigate education reform are sufficient evidence to prove the conspiracy of the capitalist class. They plot to make all workers subservient to the interests of commerce, i.e., their interests, to prune knowledge—our common inheritance—till it, too, only serves their interests. Here, Mr. Donald Ross comes to our aid. He anticipated the Shylock character of education reform and exposed the whole plot.

According to Mr. Ross there are three aspects of education. “First,” he says,

“do we want to give our people greater culture ? Do we want to educate them in those things that make for greater personal charm and greater personal achievement purely in a social sense? I mean without any regard to utility. Naturally, we do. Culture is always worth while.”

Secondly he deals with education as it effects efficiency—the view-point of the capitalist. He says:

“In manufacture to-day the best brains directing the most capable hands will win to distinction. If we can educate all our workers in the technical sciences we shall undoubtedly produce better than our rivals and sweep the commercial field.”

But Mr. Ross does not finish there. He goes on to describe how the workers of Germany linked themselves up in association and enthusiastically set themselves to further the ends of industry by discussion and experiment.

Then he says :

“But you will notice that this did not make any difference to them financially. They improved the the machinery, increased production, took an absorbing interest in their work, and made vast profits for the manufacturer who employed them. That is one flaw in the argument for greater technical efficiency of craftsmen. Under the present system the craftsman turns round and says in effect, why should I spend time and trouble on becoming a more efficient machine to produce greater wealth for another ? That is his problem. Admittedly a worker here and there may “get on” because of his knowledge, but this is simply because the others have not the same knowledge.”

Next, Mr Ross states the problem, in language almost identical to our own :

“We all know that the production of wealth in manufacturing countries is enormous. It could be enormously increased. The trouble is that it is not properly distributed. The men who make it, the men in the factory, the forge and the field, get least of it. Their first problem, then, is not how to make more, but to get more of what they already make.”

Lastly, in bold language Mr. Ross outlines the solution of the problem.

“They need education in economics. They need to learn what are the forces at work in the modern world which help a small number of men to take the largest share of wealth. They require an education that will enable them to unravel the tangled skein of modern economics ; to review industry as a whole ; to find out why there are classes and masses, and then, understanding, to apply their knowledge to the refashioning of society, so that the worker shall get a greater share of the wealth he produces. It is often objected that this would be “class” education. It would ; and it is needed, and organised labour should see that the workers get it. So the three steps in labour education should be : First, class education, which will give labour ultimate control of industry; second, technical education which will allow it to produce more wealth ; third, cultural education which will allow them to enjoy it.”

In places, Mr. Ross lays himself open to misconstruction, but there is little doubt that he points to Socialism as the only remedy. In other places he has been responsible for some confusion, but the above quotations from an article appearing in “Reynolds’s Newspaper,” Aug. 13th, shows that he is capable of independent thought ; and what is more gratifying to the Socialist, when he exercises it honestly, he finds himself admitting and asserting the principles for which we have stood so long.

True he speaks of giving “labour ultimate control of industry,” and the worker getting “a greater share” of the wealth he produces, which is no doubt due to his own limited knowledge of economics, But once a man recognises the need for education of the workers on class lines, he has surmounted the worst obstacle. The rest is easy. For what purpose education unless it is to bind the working class in an organization to take and use the means of wealth production and distribution in their own interests ? The education needed by the working class is Socialist education, that includes economics. An education that explains to them how they are robbed, why they must organise on the basis of their class, capture the political machinery of the capitalist State and establish a system wherein wealth will be produced for use, and not for profit. Then technical education will mean greater production of wealth with less expenditure of labour power, and efficiency will no longer enrich a small class of idlers. Every invention that aids in the production of wealth, instead of being a curse, because it increases unemployment, will be welcomed because it gives more leisure to enjoy the good things of life. The instruments of production, instead of enchaining those who operate them, physically and mentally, will serve them as the means to satisfy their wants.

F. Foan

By the Way. (1916)

The By The Way Column from the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

In carefully perusing the daily press unique opportunities are afforded the student of current events to observe the amazing contradictions recorded there from time to time. When one bears in mind the statement which has been repeated on so many occasions that the present conflict is a war of liberty and to secure the rights of small nations, etc., etc., it is exceedingly difficult to reconcile this view of things with the violation of all the pre-existing conditions. One is obliged to ask : What of the suppression of various newspapers, the placing under arrest of those against whom no charge has been preferred, the threatened deportation of political refugees, and a hundred and one other similar questions.

In view, therefore, of these things one wonders when the workers will take the blinkers from off their eyes and endeavour to see things as they actually are, instead of seeing them as labour leaders and other hirelings of the master class represent them to be. A few weeks ago a new and freakish organisation, the British Workers’ National League, organised a demonstration, and, according to a comic cuts or picture paper report, we read that Mr. G. Wardle, M.P., delivered a rousing speech from which I cull the following:

“I believe that out of the evil of this great war there is arising for the democracy of all the countries a new era. Oppression and militarism are already dead. The people of the Allies are all determined that as a final result of this great struggle there shall be throughout the world a better day for all men—the day of liberty, the day of democracy, the day of the people.—”Daily Sketch,” July 15th, 1916.

Doubtless the remark “a new era” is perfectly true. An era of intensified suffering for many, an era of desolation for many thousands of homes and an era of struggles for those left behind to make a miserable pittance stretch over the weekly period. The sentence “oppression and militarism are already dead” is decidedly rich, but maybe Mr. Wardle has just awakened from a long sleep. Oh, the pity of it !

* * *

Perhaps the before-mentioned gentleman in his wakeful moments may have been in the House a few days later when a question was asked regarding the punishment meted out to a driver in France for very slightly exceeding the speed limit, and who was “awarded 90 days’ field punishment, entailing being strapped to a wagon in full view of the troops for two hours a day, and a loss of 90 days’ pay, and the loss to the man’s wife of his allotment.” The official reply was “that the court-martial was quite within its rights in awarding the punishment named. Very strict regulations have been laid down to prevent reckless driving in France the authorities there having had their attention called to a number of cases where children had been injured owing to that cause.” One week after this case was again referred to and the same minister replied “that the G. O. C. remitted a month of the sentence, and it was afterwards wholly remitted. The effect of this was to restore to the man his pay, and also the allotment to his wife. The War Secretary did not see his way to make any alteration in the law in respect to field punishment.” (Quotations from “Daily Chronicle,” Aug. 2nd and 9th, 1916.) The headlines referring to this case are also an interesting study. On the first occasion I notice, “Field Punishment. Strapped to a wagon for two hours a day.” Second, “Degrading punishment of soldiers.” Sooner or later it may possibly dawn on the hon. Mr. G. Wardle that “oppression and militarism” are far from being “dead.”

* * *

A good illustration of precept and practice was brought to the notice of the House the other day on the subject of the soldiers’ pensions. In the course of the debate Mr. Will Crooks told of a soldier discharged with a pension of 7s. 6d. a week, and the letter he received from a lady who knew of the case. An extract is highly interesting reading. It runs as follows :

“I heard you speak in ——. You said that every wounded warrior would be properly looked after by his country. You are a liar (laughter.) And you knew you were a liar when you said it. (Renewed laughter.)”—”Reynolds’s,” August 20th, 1916.

The agitation which is gradually growing on this question is, of course, somewhat serious, particularly to the labour members who in the earlier days of the war placed themselves unreservedly at the disposal of the powers that be and stumped the country in aid of “voluntary enlistment,” the while telling the workers that a grateful country would look after those broken in the war. The columns of cases of hardship grow day by day and these patriotic labour leaders are now seeing that the promises so glibly made are being falsified by later events, and thus tend to place in jeopardy their future career. Hence the vim and vigour they are placing in their united efforts to obtain some measure of recognition for a more generous scale of pension. To show I am not exaggerating the position let me quote another labour man (Mr. G. N. Barnes) in an interview with a representative of “Reynolds’s.” Pointing to a sheaf of correspondence on his desk, he said:

“These things are getting on my nerves. I simply cannot sleep for them. They all refer to the same subject—men broken since they joined the Army and discharged without the slightest provision made for them or their families in the immediate future.” (Same paper, same date.)

One could fill an issue of the Socialist Standard quite easily with cases taken at random from our masters’ Press. Only the other day the “Daily Express” devoted a portion of its front page to the case of a man who was disabled and, owing to the gratefulness not having reached maturity, was obliged to take out a barrel organ in order to maintain a wife, three children and himself. Such is the generosity of our masters. War time or peace time we are sucked like an orange and then discarded.

* * *

In my perambulations recently I noticed several exhortations to “postpone your holidays,” which advice in many cases, including my own, is superfluous, or as Cabinet ministers would reply: “the question, therefore, does not arise.” But about the same time I read :

“The Hon. Mrs.——left for Kilmarnock.

Lord——left for Rufford Abbey.

The Earl of——left for Burton-on-Trent.

Lady——left for Edinburgh.

Etc., Etc.”——Evening News,” August 8th, 1916.

In no case did I notice that anyone left for—munition works. No, that is left for we workers!

* * *

I have been much interested of late in reading about cases before local Tribunals. Just picture the scene for yourself. Council chamber, and local bumbledom (all impartial gentlemen) with all the pomp and circumstance attaching to their high office, about to hear claims for exemption from military service. Recently I came across the following under the heading of “Wisdom of Mr. Solomon” :

“At the Aldershot Tribunal, Mr. Robertson, the chairman, asked : “What is a linotype operator?”

Mr. Solomon (a member of the Tribunal and a camp furnisher) : “One who lays lino on the floor.” —”Evening Standard,” August 11, 1916.

Were it not for the fact that I read this again in a morning newspaper I should have taken it an a joke on the part of the “Evening Standard.” What an exhibition of profundity ! And is this a specimen of judges of domestic or conscientious objections ?

* * *

It appears as if one of the results of the war will be to crush out of existence as such the small capitalist, and force him into the ranks of the workers. That there is some legitimate ground for this belief is evidenced from time to time in the papers. A recent illustration is to hand in an announcement issued the other day that the London Unionist members received a deputation from the small shell makers round London, who converted their plant, formerly used to make sewing machines, bicycles, etc., to the national uses.

“They complain that the subsequent establishment by the Government of great arsenals which can be run more economically has cut into their production, and that they are threatened with bankruptcy.”—”Daily News,” August l0th, 1916.

Here, then, we observe the pathetic wail of the small capitalist who is threatened with death and destruction—not as a result of the establishment of Socialism, which has been asserted by some to he the end of all things, but by the development of capitalism in itself.

* * *

A question regarding the cost of pauper indoor maintenance was recently asked in the House of Commons. The questioner desired to know “the average cost per head of pauper indoor maintenance on 31st March, 1913, 1914, 1915, and 1916 respectively ?” The reply was as follows: “The estimated average cost per indoor pauper in England and Wales for the year ended March, 1913 was £32 12s. 10¾d., and for the year ended March, 1914 £34 9s. 4¾d. Complete returns for the later years are not yet available.” (Official Report, Cols. 2488-9, Aug. 22nd, 1910.) An old age “pension” of 5s.per week, or £13 per year, is a grand thing for the capitalist class. The economy campaign commenced before the war. See what you save the master class by holding out your hand for a dollar a week to spend the evening of your days in your own chimney corner,

* * *

A case of exceptional hardship was given some prominence in a recent issue of a Sunday paper. The facts, according to the report, briefly stated are :

“The breadwinner in a military gaol because he remained with his wife when she was in the valley of the shadow.

Separation allowance; stopped.

Windows and door of the tenement removed by landlord’s agent.

Every pawnable possession gone for food. Parish rations.”

The item of news goes on to say that “some may be uncharitable enough to say that her husband should not have overstayed his leave, and then all this trouble would not have befallen his innocent wife and children. But there is no true man who, in similar circumstances, would not be where Private Price … is to-day. About nine weeks ago Mrs. Price risked her life to bring another little Briton into the world.” It continues by stating that the husband obtained leave to be near his wife, whose recovery was not rapid, and that he was confronted with the following dilemma :

(1) Return to duty and leave his wife with children to care for, and without relative or friend to aid her.

(2) Stay with her and chance the consequences.

“He chose the latter and when he returned to barracks was awarded 56 days’ detention.” We are further informed from this Press report that a representative of the “Illustrated Sunday Herald" visited the woman and her children “at their cheerless home” and “he found a spectacle which for sheer desolation and grief could not be found elsewhere in London.” A reference is made to the family subsisting on the following parochial fare:

1 tin of treacle.

1 tin of condensed milk.

2 loaves of bread.

1 lb. of rice.

issued every two or three days”—“Illustrated Sunday Herald,” Aug. 6th, 1916

This from a capitalist paper in every sense of the word patriotic is a striking commentary on the patriotism of our masters.

* * *

The answer to the question with regard to the employment of soldiers at the Llanelly Steel Works, their rate of pay, etc., came somewhat as a shock to some of the labour men in the House when it transpired that these men were doing civilian work for soldiers’ pay, the War Office appropriating the difference. So concerned were the Labour Party that they met to discuss Dr. Addison’s reply, and

“Mr. C. W. Bowerman, M. P., said yesterday that Dr. Addison’s own confession rendered it impossible for labour to ignore such a serious infraction of the arrangements which had been previously made, and he predicted that if parliamentary action did not avail Labour would consider other ways of stopping it.”— “Globe,” August 9th, 1916.

Is this Industrial Conscription ? At last the Labour fakirs wake up, and, they bark. To interfere with the freedom of the men in the matter of the disposal of their labour-power is poaching on the fakirs’ preserves, and if anything like that’s a doing, why, they have got to be paid THEIR price.

The Scout.

The true meaning of Welfare Supervision. (1916)

From the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

Signs are not wanting that at the cessation of hostilities on the Continent and the other fronts a return of the old industrial struggles will once again be the order of the day. Even now politicians and the Press vie with each other in an endeavour to gloss over the struggle of the classes, and here and there ladle out to both employers and employees the need for a “give-and-take” policy.

The old wheezes of “co-partnery” and “profit-sharing,” which have been tried in certain businesses, have not worked out as satisfactorily as was anticipated, owing to the flood of light shed thereon by Socialist thought and criticism. And so to-day we find an agitation springing up on every hand for “Welfare Supervisors.” It is somewhat significant how fresh devices are introduced one after another in order to give a new lease of life to capitalist production and to further rivet the chains of wage-slavery around the workers.

With the institution of the ministry of munitions further official notice was given to this question of “Welfare Supervisors,” and at the same period “The Times” newspaper pointed out how, in the German workshops, this ministering to the inner man and attendance to the congenial conditions of workshop life greatly facilitated the method of production. The Health of Munition Workers Committee which was appointed issued a report in which they stated : “The provision of facilities for obtaining a hot meal at the factory are often inadequate, especially for night workers. Frequently the arrangements made for heating carried food are also wholly insufficient. Yet the munition worker, like the soldier, requires good rations to enable him to do good work.” The last clause of the report goes on to say : “The rapid growth of commercial undertakings, and in particular of munition works, makes it difficult or impracticable for the management to deal, unless by special arrangement, with the numerous problems of labour efficiency, and the personal welfare of the employee. Yet without some such special arrangement there cannot fail to be “diminished output, discontent, and unsmooth working.” Thus we see that ” Welfare Supervisors” are necessary in order to ensure that the workers shall at certain intervals, take in just sufficient fuel and oil to keep the machine running smoothly !

In this connection also “The Stratford Express” for August 12th and 19th published two articles entitled “The Human Element in Factories” by B. Seebohm Rowntree. To reverse the order of things, I venture to quote the concluding paragraph first. It says : “After more than 20 years experience of welfare supervision in my own factory, I am thoroughly convinced of the wisdom of appointing welfare supervisors where large numbers of girls are employed. They not only promote the well-being, the health and efficiency of the girls, but they save the management an enormous amount of trouble. And it must be remembered that an increase of efficiency is important, not only to employers, but also to the workers, for there cannot be progressive improvement in wages unless there is progressive improvement in methods of production.” Here we have the frank confession of a member of the employing class who freely admits that it pays to look after and improve the general conditions of factory life. The phase “it must be remembered that an increase of efficiency is important, not only to employers, but also to the workers, for there cannot be progressive, improvement in wages unless there is progressive improvement in methods of production,” merely demonstrates the fact that the more efficient the workers become, combined with the elimination of wasted energy and better conditions of labour, the greater is the surplus-value produced for the employer with a lesser number of wage-slaves required to produce a given quantity of commodities. The sop offered as an inducement to greater effort on the part of the workers—that they will get a “progressive improvement in wages”—further emphasises the measure of their exploitation.

Our author in his opening remarks tells his readers that “Welfare supervision is simply the creation in a factory of those conditions which enable each individual worker to be and to do his best.” He then goes on to say that so long as factories were small there was no need of any special organisation to secure this end, for with the close relationship of master and employee every worker could be put to the work best fitted for him ; but as factories grew larger and larger this personal relation was crowded out. “The employer no longer knew his workers even by name. They came to be impersonal ‘factory hands’ to him, who were treated in the mass, without individual consideration.” To most of our readers this will be commonplace.

Moreover, Mr. Rowntree says “some employers may think that welfare supervision is merely a fad. This is quite a mistaken view. It is not only good . . . but it is thoroughly sound business from the standpoint of the employer ;” and “it is stupid to treat workers in the mass.” Then, he goes on to ask : “What should we think of an employer who treated his machinery in the mass ? As a matter of fact he watches his mechanical equipment with extraordinary care. It is continually tested to find out if there is any overstrain. A man goes round with an oil can all day long to see that there is no unnecessary friction anywhere.” After pointing out the care and attention which is paid to the machinery the writer suggests that a similar method should be applied to the human beings who are infinitely more complex and delicate, and adds : “If only employers would treat their employees with as much consideration as they do their machines, they would have less difficulty in getting satisfactory output.” With regard to the hours of labour for girls and women a suggestion of a 48 hour week is put forward, and we are informed that the employer “is wise who adopts this course.” A little later one observes the following remark : “I question whether it ever pays to keep on working girls for more than 54 hours a week.” With regard to the question of workers partaking of lunch it is put forward with all seriousness that “a short break of, say, ten minutes in the middle of the morning is a distinct advantage.” On the subject of canteens the writer is equally emphatic, and he goes on to say that the Americans recognise “much more fuJly than we do the advantages of good canteen arrangements in the works, adding that unless girls (and the same is equally true regarding men) in a factory can get a comfortable midday meal and a restful dinner hour, they cannot be expected to do a good afternoon’s work. He also mentions that some employers look upon comfortable mess rooms and canteens as luxuries and an expense which brings in no return. “Nothing is further from the truth,” is his rejoinder to these people. Even such things as lighting, heating, and ventilation are touched upon, with the further remark that we (the bosses) are quite alive to the importance of these things in our own offices.

The method of engaging the newcomer to the factory is next dealt with at great length, it being suggested that the applicant should be engaged by the “welfare supervisor” instead of by the foreman. The supervisor would then have a talk with the applicant and ascertain her qualifications, and having decided to recommend her for employment would “try to interest her in it, making her feel both that the firm intends to do the ‘square thing’ by her, and that she must do the ‘square thing’ by the firm.” This reminds one of the old idea depicted on Trade Union banners showing the two hands clasped representing Capital and Labour ; and strange to say, these relics of the earlier days of trade union activity are still to be seen dragged through the streets on occasions when there is no possibility whatever of obscuring the class struggle ! The identity of interests, forsooth ! The robbed and the robbers doing “the square thing” ! What balderdash !

One could go on and quote more extensively from these articles, but I think sufficient has been culled to show that the whole purpose underlying them is simply an object lesson to the employing class on how, under the pretence of an interest in the welfare of their slaves, they can better exploit them. Fellow-workers, let it be an object lesson to you also.

T.

Book review: Flies in the ointment. (1916)

Book Review from the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

The New Protectionism, by J. A. Hobson, London. The Cobden Club, Westminster, and T. Fisher Unwin Ltd., Adelphi Terrace. 6d. Net.

That monumental piece of bluff and fatuity the Paris Economic Conference has been taken seriously, not by the German capitalists—-they are not entirely devoid of intelligence—but by the Free Trade apostles of this country. While almost everybody else has been laughing at the affair as a clumsy attempt to impress the mugs, not of the Germanic nations, but of the “entente” countries, the “economists” of the Cobden Club have been regarding the Conference as a sort of “red light,” and have even been moved in their trepidation to inflict upon an already sufficiently suffering world a 150 pages or so of very serious and solemn consideration of the matter.

That the recommendations of the Conference were ever seriously intended to be carried into effect after the war has been thought hardly worthy of space for discussion in these columns. It will be the wonder of the age if the “Allies” can hang together through all that they have yet to endure before they arrive at the goal of victory, or survive the conflict of interests at the settlement, much less bind up those clashing interests with fiscal bonds and the like. Those interests are by no means made one by the war. It is extremely doubtful, indeed, if those interests are unified even as far as a complete and crushing victory over the Teutonic powers.

Be it said at once that in the brochure under review the author adduces many cogent reasons why the attempt to carry out the recommendations of the Paris Economic Conference would be sheer idiocy. Having said that I have done with that side of the question. If any reader wishes to waste a tanner on those cogent reasons he has my gracious permission to do so, and incidentally he can have my copy for tuppence, with the comment chucked in that “the fool and his money’s soon parted.”

But if the Socialist is not concerned with the question of statesmen making asses of themselves by chewing “New Protectionism” thistles, he generally feels disposed to have a cut at bourgeois economics (!) when opportunity offers, and opportunity offers now.

Mr. Hobson opens thus :

“The policy of Free Trade is based upon a reasoned belief that all commerce is an exchange between the goods or services of one person and those of another, this exchange being usually effected by two monetary transactions an act of sale and act of purchase. both parties in such commerce are gainers from it: and their gains tend to be equal.”

Our author having firmly based his creed on the unshakable quagmire of an economic fallacy, proceeds to enlarge upon a “series of separatist fallacies,” of which

“the second is the separation of the interests of the seller from those of the buyer, and the false assertion that the interests of the former are, or ought to be, superior.”

If Free Trade is based upon the first-mentioned belief, then the Free Traders had better shut up shop, for the Protectionists have all the best of the argument. An exchange may be “two monetary transactions—an act of sale and an act of purchase” but there is a vast difference between the two. The seller of a commodity realizes profit, the buyer does not. The commodity is not produced for consumption, but for profit. This profit can only be realized by sale. The seller, then, is simply completing the process which finds its volition in the motive for all capitalist activity—the incentive of gain ; the lust for profit. Therefore, it is not true that both parties are equal gainers by exchange, and under the system the interest of the seller is the paramount interest.

As a matter of fact, of course, it is not at all necessary to believe that both parties concerned in an exchange benefit equally from it in order to become an advocate of Free Trade, and it is mere moonshine to say that the policy of Free Trade is based upon such a belief. The Free Trader who counts—the Free Trader among the ruling class—recognises the paramountcy of his interets as a seller, since he knows that in each cycle of his industrial operations—in which field the vast bulk of both his buying selling is done—he sells more than he buys, and this difference between what he buys and what he sells is the sole incentive of his buying and seeing at all.

He starts by buying raw material and labour-power, and he ends by selling the product of the combination of the two. And always, except in the comparatively rare instances where he has made a sad muddle of things, the amount of his sales exceed the amount of his purchases, else where does his profit come in ?

Free Trade is mainly the policy of the manufacturer who hopes to sell in foreign markets, and for these reasons : If he has to pay a duty on his raw materials he cannot recover it in the world market, hence he is handicapped as a seller ; i.e., he must either sell for more and consequently sell less, or he must sell for the same as has foreign competitors and himself shoulder the duty. In either case he realizes less profit. The second reason is that if his wage-workers have to pay a duty on their necessaries of life he, the employer, will have to pay more for their labour-power, and again when he sells his commodity he realizes less profit.

And now mark the working of the mind of the bourgeois Protectionist. He usually is producing for the home market. If he has to pay more for his raw materials because of a tariff, be can get that back in the protected home market, while if he has to pay more for his labour-power because of the tariff on his wage-slaves’ necessaries of subsistence, he calculates that the higher price and wider market Protection enables his commodities to enjoy will more than counterbalance that disadvantage.

The underlying motives, therefore, of both the Free Trade and the Protectionist policies are not any concern for the equality or inequality of benefit arising from exchange, but the desire to have established that system best suited to the economic of the individuals holding the respective views. And it may be said that the tendency is to protect the home market when that market is of greater importance than the world market, and to resort to Free Trade as the export trade is developed. In view of this we may expect to see a revivifying of the Protectionist policy as the development of the manufacture of the more backward countries brings about a relative restriction of the foreign market for every country.

In close connection with this phase of the question “Free Trade versus Protection” Mr. Hobson may be quoted again. He says on page 8 :

“If the Bradford weaver gets Protection and nobody else, he stands to gain. But if all other British trades, local and national, engaged in making articles he needs in his trade—e.g., wool, coal, machinery, dyes, etc.—or articles of food, clothing, furniture, on which he spends his wages, also get Protection, each duty to protect those other trades filches from him a bit of the gain he stood to make if the Bradford woollen trade were alone protected. A general tariff protecting all British trades equally would thus be found to make so many deductions from the value of the special Protection enjoyed by the woollen trade as to convert it from a gain into a loss. The higher prices of woollens which his Protection enabled him to get would be outweighed by the added higher prices of the various article required for use in his trade and for his private consumption.”

This, of course, is incorrect, as is easily demonstrated. Let us suppose “a general tariff protecting all British trades equally to the tune of, shall we say, 10 per cent. Our Bradford weaver buys “wool, coal, machinery, dyes, etc.” (much of which being home produce, he would not have to pay any duty on) value say, £100 prior to the tariff. He then purchases labour-power of the pre-tariff value of say £50. Even if we assume that the whole of the material had been subject to the tariff, and the labour-power had been produced entirely upon duty-bearing substance, the Bradford wearer would hare to pay on account of the tariff 10 per cent. on only the amount of his outlay, £150. But when he came to sell his commodity in the home market he would find his foreign competitor penalised to the extent of 10 per cent. of the full value of the commodity, which would he, say, £200. So against an penalty of 10 per cent. on £150 the Bradford weaver finds he has increased opportunities (so long as he sells in the protected market), in the way of increased sales and higher prices, equal to 10 per cent. on £200. “His private consumption” is by no means sufficient to materially affect this argument.

Again, on page 6, our author talks through his hat. He says of the Protectionist :

“He makes his separate appeal to the man as producer, tells him that selling is more important than buying, and that the money he receives is more important than what he can buy with it.

It is through consumption that the co-operative nature and value of commerce is realized.”

The crux of the whole matter is, who does the Protectionist appeal to, or, for that matter, who does the Cobdenite appeal to ? If to the capitalist, then it has already been shown that the capitalist is far more of a producer (in the controlling, not the operative sense) than consumer, and that it is to production that he owes all he possesses, which he realizes through the act of selling. It is logical, therefore to appeal to the capitalist as a producer, and both the Protectionist and the Free Trader are found to do so in the last analysis. Even Mr. Hobson does so when he says, “the higher prices . . which his Protection enabled him to get would be outweighed by the added higher prices of the various articles required for use in his trade.” On the other hand, if the appeal is to the workers, then it is about as logical to appeal to him as a consumer as it would he to try to interest a horse in the cost of his forage. Mr. Hobson assents to this when he states that the higher price of the worker’s “food, clothing, furniture, etc.,” “filches . . a bit of the gain” from the Bradford weaver.

There are plenty of other fallacies in the book under review, but I have room only to deal with one or two more. Mr. Hobscn says on page 4 that

“The notion that the expansion of foreign markets obtained within the last two decades by German or American traders is a corresponding loss to British traders is sheer nonsense. To a large extent those markets were “created” by the special economic and commercial activities of the German or American trader. For the rest, an enlargement of our foreign markets which, in default of German or American competition, might have taken place, would have involved a diminution of our home markets.”

What a conception of the capacity of the commodities market ! And what a conception of the modern capitalist power for production ! Mr. Hobson says it is a falsehood to represent the commercial competition between two nations as “a struggle between two nations for a limited amount of profitable foreign market.” He declares that “There is no such absolute limit to quantity of foreign market.” Yet our author admits that there is competition. It would be interesting to hear Mr. Hobson’s explanation of what that “commercial competition” is for, and how it arises. Nobody competes for that which is (in the practical sense) unlimited. It is limitation which is the very foundation of competition.

And then mark the ludicrous suggestion that it is productive capacity that is limited in that statement, “an enlargement of our foreign markets . . . would have involved a diminution of our home markets.” The army of unemployed means nothing to Mr. Hobson : the factories working short time or closed down are without significance to him ; the periodical crises, when the warehouses are choked with goods which can find no outlet in any market, at home or abroad, make no impression on his mind. One can go on producing to any extent, in our author’s view, and the problem of markets will solve itself. If the market does not exist you simply “create” it. The only danger is that, if you “create” much “foreign market” the home market will have to go short because capitalist production is so inelastic that it cannot respond to the call for expansion.

A. E. Jacomb

Analysis of Wealth. IV. Accumulation. (1916)

From the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

Link to Part 3.

Capital is an accumulation of surplus-value. Whatever the original capital with which capitalist production started may have been it has long since disappeared, consumed by the capitalist class.

Likewise with the individual upstart. Even if we grant that by “his own exertions” he becomes possessed of a sum of money, this sum does not become capital until he uses it to exploit labour-power. As this process continues his capital comes to consist of accumulated surplus-value, while his original sum disappears in consumption.

Other things remaining the same the accumulation of capital implies an increase in the demand for labour-power ; for capital, in order to remain itself, must grow by the exploitation of ever more labour-power. This in itself gives rise to an increase in the rate of wages, since in the course of time the demand must tend to outstrip the supply as provided by normal increase in the labouring population.

Capital, however, is by no means satisfied with this state of affairs. It sees in the natural limits of population a limit to the rapidity of its own growth. Hence as we have shown in a former article, it exhibits a historical tendency to force on the productivity of social labour by specialisation of individual functions and by the introduction of machinery. Thus it wrings from a given quantity of labour-power a larger proportion of surplus-value. Therefore, along with the accumulation of capital goes an alteration in what Marx calls its technical composition. Its constant portion, i.e., that invested in the passive factors of the labour process, increases at the expense of the variable element which purchases labour-power.

This enables production to be carried on on an ever-increasing scale without the demand for labour-power increasing sufficiently to cause a rise in its price. On the contrary it reduces the demand for labour-power to such a point as to cause a permanent over-supply of workers ; in other words, it creates an industrial reserve army—the unemployed.

The larger the scale on which an individual capitalist does business the more he is enabled to economise and reduce the number of his employees in proportion to work done. The cheaper, therefore, can he sell his commodities (since they embody less labour) and the keener becomes his competition against his rivals. They in turn are forced to economise and to and “extend the scale of their operations as rapidly as possible. In the long run the large capitals become larger while small ones get absorbed or wiped out ; for the market soon refuses to bear the increased weight of goods supplied by this acceleration of production. This centralisation of capital causes further economy and increases the industrial reserve army.

Thus in the process of accumulation we observe on the one hand a tendency to increase the productivity of labour and on the other hand a contraction of the market for its products, seeing that the growth of the unemployed lessens the demand for commodities, both on their part and on the part of those actually employed whose places they are ever ready to take.

These two forces act and re-act on each other to an increasing extent. The competition of the unemployed forces the actual workers to submit to the lowest wages and the maximum amount of work. This increases the accumulation of capital, which in turn intensifies competition among the capitalists for the market, causing further economies and more unemployed.

At one end of the social scale, then, we have the concentration of capital in fewer hands and consequent luxury and idleness ; at the other end, absence of all wealth other than than necessary to secure the workers’ continued existence in a state of overwork, coupled with a deadweight of destitute wretches denied even that questionable privilege. This state of affairs arises inevitably from the very nature of capitalist production, and its special features are aggravated with every step in capitalist progress. Even the statistics compiled by capitalist authorities, governmental and otherwise, bear out this conclusion.

So far we have examined only the growth of capital. It remains for us to consider its origin and destiny. Assuming on the one hand a class with the means of production and on the other a class without these means it is easily seen that the former can exploit the latter to an ever-increasing degree.

The question arises, however, as to how this relationship was established. Orthodox economists and other apologists for things as they are assure us that it is solely due to the virtues of the possessors and the vices of the proletariat. If by virtue we mean work, however, we have already seen that the accumulation of capital by no means bears out this fairy tale. At present and for centuries the workers with all their toil have been unable to accumulate. If the capitalists saved money by work it was an extraordinarily long time ago. We are forced, then, to turn to history for a solution of the problem.

The system of society immediately proceeding the present social system in the course of evolution we know as Feudalism. It consisted of a complex hierarchy of lords and vassals bound to each other by the duties of military support and obedience and the right of protection. As a basis for this system was serfdom. The land was parcelled out among the lords and their subordinates, and while the latter cultivated the land of their lords they had land of their own for their personal use. In the towns chartered freemen carried on handicrafts and commerce. Thus reciprocal obligations existed and were established by feudal law and custom. No man lacked the means of subsistence, or an occupation. The lords exploited their subordinates, but the latter possessed something tho modern wage slave lacks—security!

The decay of feudalism forms the starting-point of capitalist development. In England it was spread over the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries. By degrees the peasants and handicraftsmen freed themselves from servile duties and became independent producers, while in conjunction with the growth of trade and the production of commodities arose and flourished the merchant class, who sandwiched themselves parasitically between the producers on either side of the exchange and incidentally fleeced both whenever occasion offered.

The feudal nobility, exhausted, in numbers and resources, by friction among themselves, disbanded their retainers, who thenceforth become propertyless men seeking employment for a living. Large estates passed into the hands of wealthy farmers and burghers, who did not hesitate to evict the tenants in order to convert one-time arable land into sheep pastures. The new nobility also confiscated common land for similar purposes spurred on by the increase in the price of wool. The spoliation of the Church during the Reformation aggravated this condition, and by the end of the 16th century a considerable labour-market had come into being, consisting of expropriated agriculturists, disbanded retainers, and forlorn monks.

The process went on in stages till the 19th century, when the last vestige of the old yeomanry disappeared. At first legislation from Henry VII. onward attempted to stem the tide of usurpation, but in the 18th century the law itself had become the instrument whereby the robbery of the people was effected. Private force was supplemented by the force of the State, which has remained to this day the agent of the plutocrats. From the first it penalised the disinherited for their misfortune : flogging and branding them was its most merciful means of dealing with them.

This, as Marx says, established the “discipline necessary to the wage-system,” and encouraged the new-born proletariat to submit to the low wages and long hours at first legally enforced by the State.

As the workers became habituated and resigned to their fate the severity of the penal legislation relaxed, only to be applied with all its original vigour again when the workers found in combination a means of parrying the onslaught of the masters.

If to-day Trade Unions and strikes are legal it is only because the capitalists have been able to circumvent the determination of the workers by counter organisation, increased economy, and the corruption of the unions themselves.

The labour-market once established, the genesis of the capitalist class followed as a matter of course. In agriculture the farmer, one­-time agent for the landowner, was transformed into an independent exploiter. Whereas the independent peasant had previously produced many of his own requirements, such as clothes, in addition to purely agricultural products, now, as a wage-worker for the capitalist farmer, he had to purchase these elsewhere. Hence arose a domestic market for capitalist industry in the towns. Merchants and money lenders were not slow to take advantage of this. Employing numbers of disinherited peasants, etc., they entered into competition with the independent handicraftsmen of the guilds, and owing to the larger scale of their operations and the division of labour in the workshops which they introduced, they were ultimately able to outstrip the guildsmen in the race. In the face of this competition the guilds went to pieces and added more exploitable material to the labour market. 

At the same time there arose the struggle between the capitalist nations of Europe for world domination. Spain, Portugal, Holland, France, and England followed one another in rapid succession in exploration and conquest in Africa, America, and Asia, plundering the natives of their wealth and converting them into slaves for export to plantation colonies. The plunder thus obtained by the agents of the “merchant adventurers” helped to form new capital in England and on the Continent for the exploitation of white slaves.

These are the methods, drawn very mildly, by which the modern “respectable” class rose to power. The depths of their historic depravity are in direct proportion to the “loftiness” of their professed ideals. Champions of Justice, Freedom, and Charity, their career is indelibly stained with robbery, slavery, and murder. Need it be added that it shows no signs of improving from the standpoint of the workers ?

To sum up, modern wealth or capital is a product of social labour, past and present, which has been and continues to be monopolised by a small class of individuals, which grows relatively smaller as the mass of disinherited producers increases. In its origin it destroyed the unity which existed between the producers and their products, including the means of production, thus reducing them to social outcasts, having no access to the means of life as provided by nature and society. This relationship it perpetuates and uses as a means of self-expansion at their expense.

Technically, however, it indicates economic progress. In the place of the isolated workers of the middle ages able to produce but a meagre variety of articles of wealth, we have to-day an international combination of producers using a highly complex organisation of machinery, means of transport and distribution capable of providing comfort and leisure for all.

What prevents this desirable consummation of industrial development ? The reader who has followed this analysis will readily see that it is the capitalist character of this social wealth, i.e., its private ownership, which alone stands in the way. The private property of the many workers has disappeared before the private ownership of a few idlers. To return to the former state is neither possible nor desirable. It is not our business to destroy the fruits of centuries of toiling agony, but rather to enter into possession of them ; and as the means of production become ever more concentrated and incapable of control save in the mass, the only alternative to private ownership by the few is common ownership.

This will reunite the producers with their means of production and simultaneously preserve technical progress, for it is this progress which forces on the revolution. It unites them in the productive process and reduces them all to the level of wage slaves for the maintenance of capital. Hence it breeds a community of interest and a common consciousness. Let us speed on the day when they will unite in one organisation with a common purpose. Let us rally them round the Socialist standard, and establish Socialism, the cooperative commonwealth.

Eric Boden

[Concluded.]

"Join up and do your bit." (1916)

From the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are going to win this war—the CLASS War. Join up and do your bit.

Frederick Engels: A Tribute. (1916)

From the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

The early days of August are eventful ones for the international proletariat. This terrible war was ushered in on the fateful 4th and it was on the 5th of August, 1895, that Marx's great co-worker passed away. Unfortunately no adequate biography of Engels has been written and the short sketch of his life by Karl Kautsky has long been out of print. A brief resumé of his life story is therefore timely, especially when the so-called “leaders of Socialism” in England are busy reviling the memory of every Socialist of German birth.

Marx and Engels paid the debt they owed to society with compound interest, and it is for us who still hold fast to the principles they laid down to make their writings known.

Frederick Engels was born in Barmen on the Rhine on Nov. 28th, 1820. His home was in the most developed part of German capitalism with its accompanying militant burgher and rising working class. For twenty years the district had been French territory and when it passed into German hands in 1815 it inherited the traditions of the French Revolution. German philosophy was at its zenith and Henrich Heine, Fuerbach and Hegel were active in the society in which Engels was born. Educated at the local school and afterwards at the “Gymnasium” at Eiberfeldt, he grew to hate the official life and politics of the German bourgeois and left his studies to take up work in a merchant house at Bremen and later at Berlin. His father was part owner of a textile firm in Manchester known as “Ermen Engels,” and from 1842 to 1844 he was employed in the business. Those days of break-neck speed capitalism, with its fearful exploitation and murder of women and children in the mills, made a lasting impression on Engels, and he threw himself into the incipient working-class movement of that time. Those who are interested can consult in the British Museum the files of the Bronterre O’Brien’s (Chartist) “Northern Star” and in Robert Owen’s “New Moral World’’ for many contributions from his busy pen.

In 1844 he returned to Germany and thence to Paris, where he revived his friendship with Karl Marx which had begun two years before. Their common views led to their joint authorship of “The Holy Family’’ or a Review of the Critical Critique against Bruno Bauer and his followers. Published in Frankfurt in 1845, this work dealt a mortal blow at the idealist philosophy of the Hegelian school and showed that changes in the “world of ideas” cannot lie explained by themselves hut only by the previous changes in the material world.

Soon afterwards he published the result of his investigations into proletarian life, entitled “Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844,” a work which is widely quoted to-day and shows that even in 1844 Engels studied material conditions in order to found a social science. Here he traced the effects of the industrial changes on the social life of the workers and showed that the reformism of Chartism and the idealism of Owenism could not he the basis of a Socialist movement. He wrote for the "German French Year Book" in 1844, ''Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy," which was the first attempt to found Socialism upon Political Economy.

Upon his return to Barmen to complete the “Condition of the Working Class” he grew disgusted with the piety of the town and left his orthodox and conservative family to go to Brussels. He gave up mercantile life and joined Marx here alter the latter had been expelled from France through the “kind" offices of the Prussian Government. They cut themselves off from the Bourgeois philosophers of Germany and the young Hegelians, and promoted an international workers’ movement, The Communist League. Engels went to Paris and by means of educational work laid the basis for a democratic organisation to replace the secret societies that had formerly existed. Marx and Engels became so well known and relied upon that after two Congresses of the League they were instructed to prepare a manifesto of its aims. Back in Germany at Cologne they took control of the daily "Neue Rheinische Zeitung." Its work was difficult as it stood alone in its clear conception of the necessities of the time.

The ’48 revolution showed that the politically and economically unripe Germany was full of illusions as to the meaning of the struggle and mistook the struggle of the small property-owners against the government for a social revolution.

The labourers were betrayed by the small bourgeoisie after they had helped the latter and the “Neue Rheinische Zeitung” was suppressed. Engels was persecuted and fled to Switzerland. Marx went to Paris, where a new revolt was seething, and after the bloody June days in Paris was ordered to leave. He went to London and was followed by Engels, who escaped the French authorities by travelling by ship from. Genoa.

In 1850 in Hamburg they re-established the- “Zeitung,” and Engels wrote for it his series of articles on “The Ten Hours Bill” and also his criticism of the German bourgeois revolt in “The German Imperial Plan of Campaign.”

Here he also published the articles forming his book on "The German Peasants’ War,” and through dispelling the fond illusions of the small property owners the circulation of the paper fell. Many of the Communist leaders were thrown into prison and Marx’s defence may be found in his “Communist Trial.” All literary expression was afterwards denied to them in Germany, being banned by Democrats and Government alike. Publishers and papers closed their doors to them. Marx returned to the Reading Room of the British Museum and planned his magnum opus—“Capital.” Engels joined his father’s woollen business and afterwards became a partner, but finally severed his connection with it in 1869.

Whilst Marx is chiefly known by the great works that bear his name, Engels expressed himself chiefly in the smaller books he wrote from time to time and in the large number of articles he published in many journals, now obscure. His popular style of exposition made his application of the Socialist philosophy to specific questions and problems a fruitful field of propaganda. An example of this may be found in his lucid introduction to Marx’s “Wage, Labour and Capital." He wrote much on militarism, science and philosophy between the busy hours of his business life. “The Po and the Rhine," published during the Italian War of ’59, where he dissected the methods of the Prussian Liberals, and after the war he wrote “Savoy, Nice, and the Rhine.” During the Prussian struggle of 1865 he penned “The Prussian Military Question and the German Labour Party" a further message to the proletarians of Germany. His profound military knowledge served him well when he wrote the military articles for the “Pall Mall Gazette" (London) during the Franco-German War, and also for the "Manchester Guardian." “The Prussian 'Schnaps" in the German Reichstag’' is still worthy of application to-day though written in '76.

His masterpiece, "Anti-Duhring" was written in 1877 and represents for us the classic of Socialist philosophy. The three chapters from it known as “Socialism, Utopian and Scientific” is still (next to his Manifesto) the most widely read of Socialist literature and deservedly so. It is a thorough exposition of the scientific character of Socialism, and an example of that Materialist Conception of History which he jointly discovered with Marx. “The Housing Question" was written as a reply to the Proudhonists, and "Social Conditions in Russia” against the wild theories of the Bakunists. Here he applied social science to Russian conditions and examined the mir in the light of modern Socialism.

The clear grasp of the class struggle made itself manifest in the formation of the International— ruined though it was by the reformers and Nationalists who disrupted it within whilst the agents of capitalism attacked it without. The second so-called International has again been killed in 1914 by the jingoes who have given the lie to every principle International solidarity stands for.

On the General Council of the International Engels had to fight the efforts of English Labour Leaders on the one hand and Continentai Physical Force theorists on the other.

Amidst all his writings Engels had to assist the many comrades from all parts of Europe who flocked to him and Marx for advice and to correspond with the many friends of the movement everywhere. The editing of .Marx’s works also occupied him largely.

In 1883 he brought out the 3rd edition of vol. I of “Capital,” enlarged and revised according to the wishes of Marx and provided with notes. In 1884 he published the 2nd volume dealing with Circulation, after much energy spent in finishing the preparation of the material left by Marx.

Lewis Henry Morgan’s classic work on Ancient Society appeared in 1877 and Marx and Engels were practically alone in their recognition of its value. As the Professor of Finance at Columbia University (New York), Prof. E. R. A. .Seligman, says [1],  Engels advanced Morgan’s discovery one step farther by his “Origin of the Family.”

Seligman further admits that the great founders of modern Socialism were the first to get the real significance of Morgan's work recognised. Engels showed that gentile society was transformed owing to the first fundamental division of labour—the separation of the pastoral tribes from the rest of society with the consequent intertribal exchange and rise of private property—the coming of slavery and the decline of the matriarchate.

The death of Marx in 1883 left Engels with two men’s work. He revised the English translation of the 1st vol. of “Capital” made by Dr. Aveling and Justice Moore, and worked steadily at the great task of preparing the material Marx left for the 3rd volume of “Capital.” The tremendous difficulties Engels had in this may be read in his preface to that volume. His growing eye weakness made work by gas impossible and yet he lived to accomplish his task. It stands to day as much Engels' work as Marx's, and is Engels’ undying tribute to his comrade of 40 years. “Capital” lives when thousands of critics are forgotten, and it is read more to-day than ever. Even here in America, where superficial reading is the order of the day, “Capital” is being studied as never before. In 1888 he wrote his “Feuerbach.”

The last debt Engels repaid to Marx was to edit and put in book form the articles Marx wrote for the “Rheinische Zeitung" in 1850 under the title “Class Struggle in France, 1818-1849.” In the preface Engels showed how the change in economic development had made former methods of warfare useless. It is a complete answer to the “direct action” element and its truth may he seen from the terrible defeat of the Irish insurgents under Connolly, and the massacre of the striking workers here in America recently at Pittsburg. The quick-firing gun, says Engels, has destroyed the hope of the barricade but the suffrage has given the proletariat a more powerful weapon, against which the ruling class are helpless.

Whilst working on Marx’s “Literary First Fruits” Engels was taken ill and he returned from Eastbourne to London, and after two month’s suffering with cancer of the throat he passed away in the presence of his old friend, Edward Bernstein. By request he was cremated and the ashes scattered to the winds from Beachy Head.

Thus died a man who laboured restlessly all his life for the emancipation of the working class. He bequeathed his money to Marx’s children and thus brightened their closing years.

The three volumes of correspondence between Marx and Engels published by Franz Mehring, as the “Manchester Guardian” well says, are a beautiful and rare example of lasting friendship of two gifted men whose work was indissolubly interwoven. What they owed to each other and what we owe to both may be glimpsed from their almost daily correspondence.

The test of Engels' foresight may be seen to-day, 21 years after his death, in the action of the so-called leaders of Socialism in England and Germany. Engels never trusted H. M. Hyndman, and the latter retorted by calling him the “Grand Llama of Regents Park Road ”

But if Engels could see Hyndman supporting the jingoes and bitterest enemies of our class as he is now doing, what a justification he would feel! For the Palmers Weekly he wrote , whilst he was in the grip of his illness, an article, "The Awakening," which closed with words so appropriate in spirit for our time.

    "Above all let the oppressed close up their ranks and reach out to each other across the boundary lines of every nation. Let the International Proletariat develop and organise until the beginning of the new century shall lead it on to victory."

Adolph Kohn

NOTE:

[1] The Economic Interpretation of History by Edwin Robert Anderson Seligman

The Future Generation. (1916)

From the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

I have a doleful tale to unfold. A most depressing discovery has lately been made by a learned and inspired prophet (I had nearly said profits!) of our masters. The discovery is (Woe is me!) that we, the workers, are limiting our families! Think of it! The beasts of burden are refusing to manufacture future beasts of burden fast enough for the convenience of their good, kind masters!

This doleful discovery has been made by Monsignor Brown of Southwark, and is set forth in an illuminating, (!) article in the “Evening News,” 10.7.16.

“Our Colonies” (bugs and fleas, no doubt— they are the only colonies we own, as far as I know), “depend upon the home country for a flow of new population,” says “his Rivirence,” and we, the providers for the industrial scrapheap, are disappointing by limiting our children to a paltry two or three!

Poor old Brown finds, after investigation, that “it is mainly an economic question; a matter of having enough means, not only at the time of childbirth, but for equipping the children for the struggle of life.”

And what is his remedy? Listen, for heaven’s sake listen!

That without some State help the average parent is going to sacrifice himself at the call of patriotism in order to maintain a high birth-rate I do not for a moment believe. Unless the conscience of the individual is reached by some spiritual appeal I believe these practices of restriction will continue, and become even more prevalent.

Observe how the dealer in metaphysical trash keeps within the bounds of his function! The spiritual appeal is the thing. Keep our eyes skyward and we won't examine earthly affairs too closely. Farther on in his article he suggests State aid for children. We are to receive doles in respect of each child for education, etc. Thus our masters will be given a splendid handle wherewith to control the child’s education—with-holding the dole at will to bring us to bed like dogs—holding it over our heads like the sword of Democles. Those who receive allowances from Church orphan bodies and similar institutions will realise the force of this point. They will know how their own actions are governed in order to ensure receipt of the periodical payment. It is like a National Insurance Act for children.

One point, however, Brown admits (a point we Socialists have been hammering home to the reformers for years). He says:

The Education Acts, the Factory Acts, the laws regarding the employment of children even out of school hours, the prevention of over-crowding, have all made the cost of bringing up children greater than it used to be. . . . The truth is that while these reforms are excellent in themselves, they have been effected without any substantial increase in real wages.

In other words reforms have rendered the worker’s lot harder instead of lightening it.

Brown concludes by pointing out that “Grave, serious, anti-communistic politicians and business men . . . demand that the growers of sugar beet in England shall get State aid, and this for national purposes. I would put bounties for babies before bounties for sugar beet.” In other words, as a commodity labour-power is more importence than sugar.

In their wild lust for the largest share of the world's wealth the capitalists of Europe have been recklessly pouring out the life-blood of their slaves, and now the appalling destruction of the wealth producers is causing a mild panic. The signs portend a shortage of labour-power and a drying-up of the future supply, as after the Black Plague, and again during the early years of the factory system. Our masters are getting anxious as to whether there will be a diminution in the supply of milch cows in the future.

But now let us turn to another phase of the question. Let us examine the present position of women, who are to be the bearers of the future generation, and are declining to bear the large families which are so ardently desired by our bosses.

An article in “The Quiver” (April, 1916) by A. C. Marshall gives us some information on the matter and I shall submit copious quotations from it.

The writer of the article in question estimated that the war alone had already called into the labour-market two million women workers, and that as successive Derby Groups were called up there would be employment for a further quarter of a million women. Women are now replacing men in all kinds of occupations, from portering and 'bus-conducting to engineering and billposting, working long and arduously. Regarding their work and its effect on future generations the above writer speaks as follows:

   You may take away the men and still have a home, but with the women absent the home no longer exists as a home; in the great munition centres home life is almost as extinct as the dodo, for even the grandmothers, the maiden aunts and the widows, are finding the call to work too insistent to be disregarded. . . .
   The whole point is the constant standing, and the gentle sex is not built physically to bear long, tedious hours in an upright position.
    It is not many years ago that legislation was introduced to provide seats for girl assistants in shops, and this physical reason was one of the strongest brought forward to prove necessity. Quite apart from the delicate organs of womanhood, lengthy standing brings in its train to women venous trouble and other physical difficulties, yet of the two million women workers the war has mobilised it is probable that half of them stand at their work—in most cases for ten hours a day; in others for twelve hours a day and in a few instances through the long night hours, for the Home Office restrictions are waived in these times and the writer knows of girls who toil from the early evening until six or seven in the morning. ...
    Personally, as one who has spoken to war workers in every big centre, I must set aside finally the parrot cry that it is patriotism that calls women to the work. In the cases into which I have made direct enquiry the money has been the magnet and guiding principle. The fact that the cost of living has been raised by 35 per cent, at least has had its own influence, and the opportunity of balancing shortage by working at enhanced wages has been eagerly seized—often at a personal and future cost that it is impossible to estimate. . . .
    The total abandonment of home by literally thousands, if not tens of thousands, of women ; the complete severance of domestic culture; the buying of partly or ready cooked food, which entails denial of the more wholesome and nutritions home-prepared provender; the grief and sorrow at the loss of loved ones; the absence of desire and opportunity for little ones that must inevitably follow the breaking of home ties; impaired health through overwork and worry; premature age through working in unhealthy surroundings with too much standing and too little fresh air; the fact that females will be out of proportion to males for many years —these are some of the items to be entered as woman's price for war, and a little analysis will show effects that will linger so long as life itself lasts.

Is it any wonder that capitalists are getting apprehensive as to the future supplies of labour-power? Add to the above total the myriads of women that are habitually employed in peace times in the factories, mills, and offices and an appalling total is reached, few of the female population of the working class being free from wage-labour.

When speaking from our platforms in the past, we of the Socialist Party have been frequently reproached with the parrot-cry that we were out to break up the home and destroy family life. Who are the destroyers of home life now ? Where are our homes ?

The article from which the above quotations have been taken is a record of the universal destruction of home life, of the general misery of women's lot, and of ills whose effects will far outlast the present generation. As the present writer perused the article in question his mind travelled back to the cries that spurred young British manhood to join the army. They were told they would be fighting in defence of their homes. What is the position now? The alleged enemy is supposed to be losing ground daily, but where are the homes we are supposed to be defending ? Our mothers and sisters have been driven forth to earn a miserable living, their health and vitality broken by industrialism. Our fathers, brothers, and sons are killed or crippled on the battlefield.

In conclusion, poor old Brown may rest assured that it will take quite a lot of "State help,” and a "spiritual appeal” of enormous dimensions, to arrest the steadily dwindling birthrate as it is borne in upon men and women of the working class that the supreme value of their increase is as machine food in time of peace and cannon fodder in time of war. 

Gilmac.

Editorial: "Some" Stock-Taking. (1916)

Editorial from the September 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

WHAT WE HAVE ACCOMPLISHED IN TWELVE YEARS.

With this issue we commence the thirteenth volume of The Socialist Standard. For twelve years we have struggled to preserve this mouthpiece of the class-conscious workers’ political party, and those who know the history of that struggle know that it has been a severe one. The financial difficulties of the undertaking, manfully shouldered by the mere handful of stalwarts who composed the Party in the first few weeks of its existence, were only overcome by long years of grim, patient, unremitting toil —but they were overcome. Working-class enemies of the working class, squirming under our criticism like noisome things of darkness exposed to the light of the sun, tried to stifle us in the law courts by means of that instrument —the law of libel—which rogues have placed in the hands of their fellow rogues in order to shield them from the attacks of honest men. We survived that ordeal also.

Other enemies have left no stone unturned in their endeavours to secure the suppression of our organ, and have howled themselves hoarse into the ears of “constituted authority.” But we have fought our fight with circumspection, determined that if we went down it should be upon the real issue, and in the full blaze of the light generated in and of the class struggle. On such terms “constituted authority,” much as it has hated us, has declined to put us down.

Years of hard and faithful work had the desired and expected result. Our journal came to to recognised as a serious and potent weapon in the class struggle. Just as our declared principles, and the policy arising therefrom, stood alone in the English-speaking world at fulfilling the requirements of the political party of the working class, so our paper, in which those principles were expounded with all the vigour at our command and the revolutionary policy consistently applied to every situation that arose, has come to be regarded as unique. Hence it finds, readers in almost all capitalist countries, and in English-speaking countries abroad its circulation is now considerable, as such things go.

The results are tangible. At home, at a time when our Party organ is almost our sole means of public propaganda, and when our chief avenue of circulation—the propaganda meeting —is for the time being closed to us, our sales are fully maintained, thus ensuring the continuance of our work under almost impossible conditions. But valuable as this is it is not the only result of our labour. The test of this orgy of blood, when every passion has been appealed to by wily politicians and callous owners of property, in order to inveigle men into a business which but for ignorant passion they would loathe, has found our principles sufficient and our policy sound. Taking our stand upon the fundamental antagonism of interests between the two classes in society, we have kept ourselves clear of the crushing tentacles of the octopus nationalism. And this without any change of policy, or any deviation from principle, or any trimming in the smallest particular, to meet the altered circumstances.

This final testimony of tense and harassing events has crowned all our years of arduous toil in a manner that makes the impregnability of our position obvious to all men who have eyes see, and the lesson has, by our official journal, been carried to the furthermost ends of the earth. Honest workers overseas, groping in darkness, have seen the beacon, and are shaping their course by it. Under the quiet but compelling influence of The Socialist Standard the ground is being prepared in more than one country for the establishment of working-class political organisations on S.P.G.B. lines.

So, at the end of twelve years, and in a moment of great peril, we may look back cheerfully, dated and sustained by what we have been able to accomplish rather than cast down by that which we have failed to do. It is true that during the present crisis we have not been able to say all that we could wish. But we have always maintained that those who control the political machinery control the forces of coercion, and we have always declared ourselves against trying conclusions with those forces so long as other and better means remain open to us. The spectacular has never appealed to the Socialist Party, and it has always been our policy to leave “thrills” to the sensation-mongers. We have preferred, therefore (and this remark applies no less to times of “peace” than to this time of war, for we could at any period of our history have gone down in a blaze of fireworks, amid the plaudits of the shallow pates of the gallery) to survive to carry on our work of education—dull, stodgy, ox-like work if you choose to call it such, but work essentially necessary to our victory.

But if we have not said all we should have liked we have said all that, in the difficult circumstances, we could; and beyond this, we have never said or written one word in all these troublous months, that will not stand the test of Socialist criticism. When it became impossible, owing to the Defence of the Realm Regulations, to defend the Socialist position on the public platform, we closed down our propaganda meetings rather than continue under restrictions which could only result in injury to our cause. But in our paper we have upheld the Socialist position through it all. Alone among all those in the belligerent countries claiming to be Socialists, as far as we have been able to ascertain, we took the right path at the start, and have steadily held to it.

So whether we sink or swim, whether the volume we are now commencing runs to a normal end or early meets the bully's extinguisher, we are happy to know that in its inextinguishable pages of the past two years, now safely and surely in the keeping of the working class of the world, there is the record of a Socialist party successfully withstanding the shock of the severest test it could be put to short of the final phase of its revolutionary struggle, and withstanding it, not on the strength of two or three ultra-tragic limelight “heroes,” but on the simple strength of its own sound principles and organisation.

Well for Socialism, well for the cause of working-class emancipation, that when this orgy of blood and entrails is finished, and the battered and torn and quivering remnants of the working class of the world are permitted to lay down their instruments of murder and staunch their pouring wounds, it may be pointed out to them that though they were betrayed on every hand in this tragic crisis, in the one case where they organised upon Socialist principles, they were able to keep their actions free from reproach and their movement free from taint.