Letter: SLP backs down (1996)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

SLP backs down

Four members of our Colchester Branch attended a meeting of the Socialist Labour Party in Ipswich on 25 April at which Arthur Scargill declared that he "would debate with anyone". We publish below the exchange of correspondence which followed:

"Dear Mr Scargill,

At a Socialist Labour Party meeting in Ipswich, in early May, you offered to debate with any organisation. Colchester Branch members of this Party who were at the meeting would like to take you up on that offer.

The Socialist Party would welcome such a debate and could arrange for it to be held in the East Anglian area or in Central London.

We hope to hear of your acceptance in the near future when a date and venue can be arranged.

Janet Carter, General Secretary, 

The Socialist Party. 

16 June 1996.”

"Dear Ms Carter,

Thank you for your letter regarding a debate between yourselves and the SLP.

Our policy at this time does not include such a meeting.

P. Sikorski, General Secretary, SLP.

I 3 August 1996."

We will keep readers informed of future developments. 

Correspondence: Next one please. (1915)

Letter to the Editors from the August 1915 issue of the Socialist Standard

To The Editor.

The S.LP. of A., in dealing with the criticism of A. E. J. in the “Weekly People” dated the 6th of March. They say: Pure and simple politics fail and always will fail the workers because they fail to attend to the one Source of Power which the workers possess, the economic power, that is, that power which the workers daily have in their hands when they are in the workshops—the power over industry.

A. E. J., in the “S.S.,” April issue, in the course of his remarks on the above criticism says: The idea that the workers have power over industry is exquisite foolery. What conceivable force gives them any such power, etc. In your July issue you tell the workers to use its supreme economic power for the liberation of human kind from wage slavery. Is that not a contradiction of A. E. J.’s remarks which you have endorsed by the fact that you gave publication to. What is economic power ?

Yours truly,

T. W. Creswick, 

Kennington, S.E.

———————————–

If Mr. Creswick had given the matter a moment’s thought he would have saved himself the labour of writing. The contradiction only exists in his own mind.

We may take the definition given in his own letter. That definition is narrow, but it will suffice. Economic power is power over industry. It is, as stated by A. E. J., exquisite foolery to say that the workers have this power in their hands when they are in the workshops. It is as absurd as it would be to say that the slave who lugged laboriously at an oar in a Roman galley under the lash of the slave driver had economic power in his hands. The differences between the chattel-slave and the wage-slave in this respect are due to the political rights of the latter, which are in turn the outcome of economic necessity.

In the leading article of the July “S.S.” the statement occurs, referred to by our correspondent, of the need for the working class to “become masters of the State, and use the supreme economic power for the liberation of human kind from wage-slavery.” This, of course, is the very reason we are a political party. It is because the State has supreme “power over industry.” The article in question showed how the State was rapidly becoming more and more the direct exploiter of industrial undertakings. The political State, with its armed forces and machinery of government, is ever more obviously the supreme “power over industry” that must be captured by the working class. Until the workers control it, they are themselves controlled by it both economically and politically, that is to say, both by government and by private capitalists.

The essential difference, therefore, between economic power and political power, in this connection, is that the political power is the supreme economic power. Individual capitalists only wield economic power by virtue of their political control of the State, which guarantees, enforces, limits or extends their economic power.

This simple fact, that the political State is the supreme economic power, is always overlooked by Syndicalists. It enforces the need for political action above all, as the coordinate and culmination of the organised wages struggle ; and it shows how entirely correct was A. E. J. in his stricture upon the S.L.P. of A.

Ed. Com.

That Blessed Word : Unity ! (1908)

From the July 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard 

(Con)Fusion in America.

A few years ago the question of Socialist unity engaged the attention of the two “Socialist” parties in this country. Votes were taken of the rank and file and large majorities voted in favour of fusion, but as the leaders did not desire fusion they did not allow it to come to pass.

Similarly the cry for “unity” has been raised in America, and again those first in raising the cry have been the smallest of the parties concerned.

As in England a knowledge of the mental make-up of the parties enabled many to see through the fake proposal, so will similar knowledge of the American “fusionists” enable us to value their “unity” cry for what it is worth.

In 1896 the Socialist Labour Party of America declared for the “new” Trade Unionism, and started the Socialist Trade and Labour Alliance, a union affiliated to the Socialist Labour Party, and out to smash the “pure and simple” trade unions. This caused a “split” in the Socialist Labour Party, a large section leaving and, with the “Social-Democracy” of Eugene V. Debs, forming the Socialist Party of America.

A fight then commenced between the two, most of the fighting being done by the Socialist Labour Party, who long and loudly denounced the prominent members of the latter party— Debs, Carey, Mother Jones, Simons, and so on—as “freaks,” “frauds,” and “fakers,” while the Party as such was in turns termed the “Multi-cocoa Party,” the “Kangaroos,” in fact, anything but a Socialist party, and no Socialist Labour Party member was allowed on their platform except in opposition.

After some nine years of this fighting, and at the same time attempting to organise the working class in the Socialist Trade and Labour Alliance, the membership was found to be declining at such a rapid pace that something had to be done.

Mr. F. Bohn, organiser, visiting Chicago, found himself among the “freaks,” “frauds,” and “fakers” that the S.LP. and the S.T. and L.A. were fighting—Mother Jones and A. M. Simons among them—and without instruction from either the S.L.P. or the S.T. and L.A. (his paymasters), he joined with them in signing a manifesto calling for a new union to be formed. In thus proclaiming the failure of his own union Bohn was supported in the Weekly People by such writers as Olive M. Johnson and Dan. De Leon. The Socialist Trade and Labour Alliance was thus crucified, betrayed by the leaders of the S.L.P. into the hands of the “freaks,” “frauds,” and “fakers,” and a new union—the Industrial Workers of the World—was formed. This new union, having for its object the organising of the workers to “take and hold” what they produce, enrolled a large membership, including men of all shades of political thought and of none. Those who had been “freaks” and “fakers” now became honest and earnest comrades on the economic field ; and to hide political differences politics were relegated to the rear, economic organisation and action being given the place of prime importance, and Mr. De Leon, editor of the American Weekly People, “discovered” that Marx had in 1869, said somewhere, sometime, to some one, that “only the economic organisation could set on foot the true political .party of Labour.”

Did Mr. De Leon know this before he helped to form the Socialist Trade and Labour Alliance, and before he joined the Socialist Labour Party, or is it now that he is wangling ? As there is no evidence that Marx ever made such a statement, I beg to answer the latter question in the affirmative.

But in case Marx is not sufficient, Engels is dragged in, and one need not be surprised if at any time we are told that Christ talked Industrial Unionism in the Sermon on the Mount, or that even if he did not, what he did say may be “adapted to American conditions.”

When, as a result of capitalist persecution, W. D. Haywood had become the momentary idol of thousands of American workmen, and, while still in prison, was nominated by the Socialist Party as candidate for Governorship, the S.L.P. found itself in a dilemma. Haywood was member and nominee of the “rotten” Socialist Party —yet he was a member of the pure I.W.W. According to the S.L.P. rules they could not support him, but could they risk opposing the popular Haywood ? Eventually the Colorado State Executive decided to call upon every member of the S.L.P. in Colorado to withdraw from the Party until after the election, so that they could vote for Haywood ! This remarkable wangle was supported by O. M. Johnson and Mr. De Leon, and we were told the S.L.P. refused to oppose Haywood politically because they were supporting his “economic side” !

On his release from prison, however, Haywood toured America for the Socialist Party. This roused the ire of the S.L.P., who then denounced him as a coward and a craven.

Meanwhile the I.W.W., which for a time had proved a happy hunting-ground for S.L.P. literature sellers, had had a serious split. Most of its original founders had left it. E. V. Debs, had joined the staff of the Appeal to Reason, an anti-I.W.W. paper, and those who were left were largely inclined towards the Socialist Party. This not suiting the “fighting” S.L.P., who, not content with fighting the “cravens” like Haywood, outside, and the “physical force-ists” like Williams, inside, wanted a new excuse for a declaration of war on the Socialist Party, up went the cry for Socialist “unity.”

The E.C. of the S.L.P. invited the Socialist Party to consider proposals with a view to fusion, knowing they would be rejected. They were rejected, and now the S.L.P. can forget the fond embraces indulged in with the “freaks,” “frauds,” and “fakers” at the funeral of the Socialist Trade and Labour Alliance, and clears the decks anew for hostilities.

Had the “unity” proposals been accepted bj the Socialist Party and a juncture fixed up, splits would, of course, immediately have followed; but the chance would have been taken. and the S.L.P. would have been scuttled and swallowed up in a new party, with the consent and approval of its friends, as was the Socialist Trade and Labour Alliance in 1905.

In either case it was a wangle on the part of the S.L.P. leaders, a case of heads I win, tails you lose, but the Socialist Party leaders declined to enter the game.

It will thus be seen that, as in Britain, so in America, the “fusion” trick is but a move in the long game practised by faction leaders at the expense of the principles they are supposed to be advocating. It is therefore, up to the rank and file, as the Americans would say, to checkmate the players, to overthrow the “leaders,” the “intellectuals,” to act on the truly Marxian dictum that “The emancipation of the working class must be the work of the working class itself.” When they will place principles above personalities, and understand the difference between capitalist reform and social revolution, they will find there is but one party for them. Here it is The Socialist Party of Great Britain ; in America it has yet to be born.

A. W. Pearson

American Parties and the Unity Question. (1908)

From the June 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

The article under this heading appearing in the last issue is simply the expression of the opinion of the writer alone and must not be taken to imply that the S.P.G.B. has in any respect changed its open and avowed hostility to Mr. DeLeon and the American and English S.L.P.

On second thought: From the Western Socialist (1994)

From issue 11 of the World Socialist Review

The main flaw in the industrial union as a means of emancipation is the fact that a labor union, in order to gain any sort of recognition, must open its doors, even to the point of compulsion, to any and all workers in the industry it seeks to control. If it does not do so it will not be in a position to control anything. If it does its membership must be dominantly made of workers who are not socialists.

Even if the “political arm" were 100 percent socialist, how could they hope to be backed by a union whose membership were predominantly non and anti-socialist? And if it is argued that the socialists of the “political arm” would educate the union members to socialism, this merely knocks De Leon’s theories for another cocked hat. This would certainly demonstrate once more that the political party does not arise from the industrial union.

The truth of the matter is that unions of any kind, whether craft or industrial, arise out of the relations of wage-labor and capital. They can only be used as weapons by the workers in resisting the pressure against their living standards by the capitalist class. They are the means the working class must use under this system to sell labor-power at its value. It may be argued that industrial organization is superior to craft unionization, but even if this is so it only applies in so far as it concerns a capitalist society, for no union could possibly be carried over into socialism. The material conditions for their existence will be absent in a society devoid of economic classes.

“The Socialist Labor Party” HARMO, July-August 1948

The S.L.P. of America again. (1915)

From the December 1915 issue of the Socialist Standard

The “Weekly People” (New York) returns in its issue of October 16th to the controversy which has been carried on recently in its pages and those of the Socialist Standard. Things are in a bad way, however, with the “Weekly People,” as is evidenced by the fact that it is forced to strain every nerve to keep its readers amused in order to hide the fact that it has nothing more to contribute to the discussion. It is humour of the first water, of course, to depict the “S.S.” as a band indulging “itself in the spoil of furnishing the ‘music'” which it told the Socialist Labour Party of America it would have to face sooner or later. That humour, however, is only the grimaces our antagonist is indulging in in the hope of detracting attention from the sorry figure it is dancing to the music supplied.

It may be remembered that in our September issue we took from the S.L.P. “Address to the Affiliated Parties of the International Socialist Bureau,” the following :

“Besides, we believe that after the war is over the political conditions will be so adjusted as to compel the European comrades to give their undivided attention to the question of industrial unionism.”

and that we adduced this as disproving our opponents’ claim that their Address made “NO attempt to keep the workers from turning their eyes to class-conscious political action.” Of course, they don’t like to have this brought up against them. This unfortunate utterance, which arises out of their rock-bottom contempt for SOCIALIST political action, they think we should have been blind to. That it appeared in an Address issued by the Executive of the S.L.P. to the International Movement is nothing. It should be ignored, regarded as a meaningless vapouring—or if it was referred to at all it should have been accompanied by its context with special annotation making clear that, though the authors of the Address said in this place that they thought that after the war the European comrades would have to abandon political action (“give their undivided attention to the question of industrial unionism”), other parts of their Address indicated that they didn’t think anything of the kind. If we had only done that we should have produced harmony that our opponents would have been delighted to dance to. Also it would have saved them the trouble of playing that dreamy waltz themselves.

For this is all they have been able to achieve. The statement in the Address that its authors thought that after the war political conditions will be so adjusted as to compel the European comrades to give their undivided attention to the question of industrial unionism is plain enough for anything. How this is to come about might, be open to astonishing explanation, it is true, but no explanation that does not demolish the statement can affect its definite pronouncement that its authors think that after the war the European comrades would be compelled to give their UNDIVIDED attention to the question of industrial unionism. The statement does not depend on its context. To insist on the context is simply to whine to be allowed to drop the statement out.

Now it is clear that the same adjustment of “political conditions” that the S.L.P. Executive conceive of as compelling “the European comrades to give their UNDIVIDED attention to the question of industrial unionism” must perforce compel them to cease bestowing any of that attention upon political action. No appeal to the “context” can alter this fact, nor can any sarcastic references to “ingenious logic-choppers who are more concerned with the twisting awry of words and the fitting together of phrases to a syllogistic subtlety than they are in gathering the meaning or extracting the essence of an argument or declaration.” There is a rich roll in all that, but it is so familiar. The illogical cornered usually raise the cry, “logic-choppers.” But if there is any other “meaning or essence” in the declaration than that which we have found, why do not our opponents “extract” it for us ?

They do not because at the very bottom they do not believe in the vital necessity for political action. In spite of the reiteration of the demands for political organisation this note of disbelief in the essential need for political action runs through the Address. The vagueness of this document makes it difficult to illustrate this by extracts (which also have the disadvantage of leaving behind a “context”), but the atmosphere of the Address has been translated in an answer to a correspondent in the “Weekly People” of Sept. 4th, in which it is said :

“If the Socialist forces of Europe had been industrially organised, and when we say “industrially organised” we mean revolutionarily industrially organised, they could with their present numbers, have PREVENTED THE OUTBREAK OF THE WAR.”

There it is, plain enough. In spite of the fact that the S.L.P. recognises that the “European comrades” are “so enmeshed in bourgeois politics” that they have lost sight of Socialism—in other words, they are politically rotten—yet there is no single word in the reply to their correspondent to indicate that that political rottenness is even a factor in the failure of the International in the face of the crisis of August 1914. This contempt for the political weapon, prevailing in the Address, belies all our opponents’ mouthings about being “committed to class-conscious political action.”

The fact is the S.L.P. have not grasped the true aim of Socialist political action—the real value of the political weapon. De Leon never grasped them, and those who still preach his absurdities, being mentally bound by the legacy of shallow thought he bestowed upon them, have no glimmering conception of the true function of the political weapon in Socialist hands.

On the 10th July, 1905, Daniel De Leon delivered an address at Union Temple, Minneapolis, Minnesota. This address was published by the Socialist Labour Party of America under the title : “The Preamble of the Industrial Workers of the World.” On pp. 36-7 of that publication De Leon is reported as saying :

“The bourgeois shell in which the Social Revolution must partly shape its course dictates the setting up of a body that shall contest the possession of the political Robber Burg by the Capitalist Class. The reason for such initial tactics also dictates their ultimate goal—THE RAZING WITH THE GROUND THE ROBBER BURG OF CAPITALIST TYRANNY. The shops, the yards, the mills, in short, the mechanical establishments of production, now in the hands of the Capitalist Class—they are all to be “taken,” not for the purpose of being destroyed, but for the purpose of being “held”; . . . It is exactly the reverse with the “political power.” That is to be taken for the purpose of ABOLISHING IT. . . . Suppose that at some election the class-conscious political arm of Labor were to sweep the field ; suppose the sweeping were done in such a land-slide fashion that . . from President down to Congress and the rest of the political redoubts of the capitalist political Robber Burg, our candidates were installed ;—suppose that, what would there be for them to do ? What should there be for them to do ? Simply TO ADJOURN THEMSELVES, ON THE SPOT, SINE DIE.”

That is the conception De Leon had of the end of political conquest. His idea of “razing with the ground the robber burg of capitalist tyranny” was simply to capture the machinery of Government and instantly abandon it. His idea of a political organisation was a body so hide-bound that it could have no consciousness outside politics. It could not know that its economic counterpart purposed “taking and holding” the “plants of production and distribution,” therefore it could not continue to hold the “robber burg of capitalist tyranny,” in order that it might control the armed forces that the capitalists have provided against any attempt to take and hold their property. No, that (says De Leon) would be usurpation.” The elected representatives could only “adjourn themselves sine die.” They could not even stop to take away the policeman’s baton and disband the armed forces to make things easier for the economic arm in its task of taking and holding.

Where such a conception as this exists of the political triumph how can there be any fundamental belief in the essential necessity for political action or any respect for it ? If the political triumph means no more than the capture of the enemy’s guns and the immediate abandonment of them to the enemy again, then we also should say to blazes with political effort. If the political triumph would still leave the armed forces and other instruments of oppression in the capitalist control, then we also might pass as near enough the S.L.P. dictum that the “economic organisation [is] . . . the only conceivable force with which to back up the ballot”—which wouldn’t then be worth backing up. If nothing more was to be gained by political conquest than the S.L.P. imagine, then we should have to find a sole reason for political endeavour in De Leon’s ingenious argument that the institution of the suffrage “is so bred in the bones of the people that . . . chimerical is the idea of expecting to conduct a great Movement, whose palpable aim is a Socialist Revolution, to the slogan of ‘Abstinence from the Ballot-box.’ ”

But we have other views regarding the political weapon—views which prevent us from harbouring even a thought of such shallow and cynical expediency, the mere expression of which reveals a contempt for the true function of Socialist political action which give the lie to our opponents’ claim to political integrity.

But there is more music to come on this phase of the discussion. The report of the First Convention of the Industrial Workers of the World quotes (p. 226) De Leon as saying :

“The situation in America . . . establishes the fact that the “taking and the holding” of the things that labor needs to be free can never depend upon a political party. (Applause.) If anything is clear in the American situation it is this : That if any individual is elected to office upon a revolutionary ballot, that individual is a suspicious character. (Applause.) Whoever is returned elected on a program of labour emancipation ; whoever is allowed to be filtered through by the political inspectors of the capitalist class ;—that man is a carefully selected tool, a traitor to the working people, selected by the capitalist class. (Applause.)”

These well-applauded but dismal sentiments lead to the logical conclusion that political endeavour is futile. Surely, in face of such a hopeless situation the only sensible thing to do is to foreclose on the political organisation and have done with it. Any talk of dismantling the capitalist “political Robber Burg,” if this is the position, is sheer rainbow-chewing. It does, however, throw an illuminating ray over that passage we are accused of having torn from its context, and justifies our reading of it. For if, as the S.L.P. Address tells us, the “country that is more developed industrially [America] only shows to the less developed the image of its own future,” then when, the political situation described by De Leon as existing in America, develops in Europe, the “European comrades” will probably be forced into the non-political lines of action prophesied for them by the S.L.P. That, however, only substantiates what we said that the Address was a deliberate attempt to prevent the workers from turning their eyes to class-conscious political action.

Now for another point. We challenged our opponents upon their implication that the action of those who “have become so enmeshed in bourgeois politics that they have lost sight of the ultimate goal of the Socialist Movement can be Socialist action. “Ha,” laughs the “Weekly People,” “how the challenge rings . . . calling upon us to prove—if we maintain it—that the action of those” and so on. If they maintain it ! What caution ! To confirm our view of the matter we quote the Address as follows :

“We recognise the fact that the Socialists of Europe have been confronted with many problems which had to be solved before the real issue, Socialism versus Capitalism, could be decided. These problems have been largely of a political nature Politically, Europe as a whole is far behind the United States. Here the issue is clip and clear, Socialism versus full-grown Capitalism. Not so in Europe. There large remnants of feudalism remained, blocking the path of Socialist revolutionary progress, and the attention of the European, comrades has therefore been given almost exclusively to these problems, with the result that they have become so enmeshed in bourgeois politics that they have apparently lost sight, for the moment at least, of the ultimate goal of the Socialist movement.”

And now this from the “Weekly People” of  Dec. 12, 1908 :

“The enlightened conduct of the German Social Democracy will be misunderstood only by the pure and simple Socialist politician of America, for the identical reason that the German Social Democracy deserves applause for temporarily suspending its Socialist work and assisting the bourgeois Radicals, such a policy in America deserves condemnation, As an applauder of the German Social Democracy, the S.L.P. of America rejects, for America, the tactics that German conditions demand.”

The S.L.P., then, applauded those tactics of the German Social Democratic Party which led to the latter “becoming so enmeshed in bourgeois politics that they have apparently lost sight, for the moment at least, of the ultimate goal of the Socialist movement.” They praised that “enlightened conduct” which culminated in the vote of credit for the war. In face of that endorsement of action which has had so sad a result one might expect a little caution in replying to the question whether the actions of such people can be Socialist action. If they maintain it, indeed ! Let them deny that they maintain, it and they are up a tree ; let them admit it and they concede the point.

And we are here up against the whole crux of the matter, which is that it is this building of the political organisation on an unsound basis and with unsound material, the following of that corrupt and rotten path of political opportunism so vigorously applauded by the S.L.P., which is responsible for the failure of the International in the present crisis (and that failure is not that it did not prevent the war [which was beyond its power in any event], but that it did not maintain the Socialist position).

As we have said, it was in order to hide this result of the political obscurantism they had applauded, and to turn the workers from the political means to industrial unionism that the S.L.P. Address was issued. It is clear that the S.L.P. could hardly denounce conduct they had themselves applauded—and practised. In 1907 the mine-owners in Goldfield issued scrip, and demanded that their wage-workers should accept it as payment for wages. This led the “Weekly People” (Dec. 21, 1907) to issue a touching, cap-in-hand “Open Letter” to the “Robber Burg of capitalist tyranny” in America (Congress) identifying the interest of the occupants of that “Robber Burg” and the workers in the following words :

“An issue has arisen in which Labor and intelligent Capital, Capitalists (if intelligent) and Socialists alike have a common cause—THE CAUSE OF AVERTING SOCIAL CALAMITY.”

That is how they “reject, for America, the tactics German conditions demand.”

Now then, let us see where this brings us out. The so-called Socialists of Germany, the so-called Socialists of France, the so-called Socialists of Britain, have all acted under the same specious plea as the S.L.P. The threat of the “foreign foe” was in their idea a threat of “social calamity,” and like the S.L.P., they made “common cause” with the capitalists to avert it. Thus the American pseudo-Socialists who say that the “capitalists and the Socialists alike have a common cause—the cause of averting social calamity,” and the pseudo-Socialists of Europe who say (as the German “Socialists” are reported to have told their Belgian comrades at the Maison du Peuple in Brussels) “as the development of the proletariat was bound up with the development and economic prosperity of the nation, German Socialists were bound to side with the Government,” are tarred with the same brush, and may be feathered with the same feathers.

Which is why the S.L.P. still claim that those in Europe who have lost sight of Socialism are “still the Socialist movement of Europe.”

There are one or two other points in our opponents’ latest screed which may be dealt with at a future date ; but meanwhile, would the S.L.P. spokesman like to confirm and explain that champion idiocy propounded in the Address—that industrial unionism is the embryo, the undeveloped fcrm of future society ? Or has he not the courage ?

A. E. Jacomb

Editorial: The Passing of De Leon. (1914)

Editorial from the June 1914 issue of the Socialist Standard

The death of Daniel De Leon in America recalls the controversy over so-called Direct Action by the working class. Joining the S.L.P. when it was nominally, as well as actually, a reform party, De Leon also affiliated with the corrupt Knights of Labour, and as a result of the secession of some elements the Socialist Trades and Labour Alliance was formed to act in co-operation with the S.L.P. But a union of opposing elements could not succeed. In spite of the claim that by economic unity political unity would also be established, a split soon took place, and the Socialist (!) Party of America was formed.

In 1905 “Industrial Unity” was again the cry, and once more it was urged that by uniting economically, political harmony would be secured.

De Leon, Debs and other political enemies came together in the I.W.W., which taught that Industrial Unionism would establish Socialism. Politics was but a reflex or an afterthought, so to speak. Anarchists as well as “Socialists”, reformers as well as others, came together in the Industrial Workers of the World. Some of them believed in politics, while others did not.

Such fictitious unity could not last, and soon it was found that, instead of uniting, it made those it embraced more divided than ever. It was not long before Debs and his “Socialist” Party friends were outside the I.W.W. Soon arose the question of what Industrial Unionism meant, some contending that politics were unnecessary and others that they might be useful, and so on.

The arrival of Wm. Haywood from jail soon caused a split among the unity-hunters of the I.W.W., and we were faced with two I.W.W.’s – one forced to give some vague recognition of the value of political action, and the other, embracing Haywood, Bohn, Ettor and Giovannitti, yearning for sabotage, physical force, and such moonshine.

The closing years of De Leon’s life were practically a sea of troubles on this “industrial action” question. One after another his lieutenants went over to the so-called Socialist party, or to the rival I.W.W. Frank Bohn, James Connolly, Trautmann (who has now come home to the I.W.W. fold), and even his own son, Solon De Leon, making tracks for that ark of confusion, the S.P. of A.

Verily the Industrialist rubbish spelt Nemesis for the S.L.P.

There is a lesson for the workers on this side of the Atlantic to leave the suicidal policy of Industrial Unionism severely alone.

The Socialist Party and Trade Unionism. (1906)

From the September 1906 issue of the Socialist Standard

[All Resolutions adopted during the course of this discussion have to be referred to the Party Membership through the Branches for ratification or otherwise. The decision of the Party will be published after the full Report of the Debate has appeared.]

[Continued from August issue.]

Fitzgerald said he was sorry Jackson had moved this amendment because the substance of it was contained in a resolution he intended to move. He opposed the resolution because it contained “terminological inexactitudes” and committed the movers of it to a position which he thought they perhaps did not understand. Because he contended that if the class principle was to be first it was contradictory to say the industrial was not non-sectional. The word “industrial” gave certain impressions in certain directions. The man in the street would have the idea that it was something different from the ordinary Trade Unions. But to the Socialist the word “industrial” conveyed something distinct. It conveyed I.W.W. The members of the Party who met to form an I.W.W. club during the week went there either to form a club to propagate Industrial Unionism or they went there as deliberate frauds. He would read the call:—

“LONDON NEXT.

“Following on the resolution passed at the S.L.P. Annual Conference, April 15th, endorsing Industrial Unionism and pledging our membership to set up clubs for the spread of Industrial Union principles, several members of the London S.L.P. and of the S.P.G.B. have decided to call together a meeting to the end of formally constituting such a club. 

The meeting will be held at the Communist Club, Charlotte Street, Fitzroy Square, W. on the evening of May the 16th at 8 p.m. Sympathisers of whatever political party are invited to attend and assist in the formation of a revolutionary economic organisation.”—Socialist, May, 1906.

The call fairly and squarely was to those who sympathised with the resolution of the Annual Conference of the S.L.P. on the I.W.W. The resolution referred to in the call was :—

“Considering that the task of emancipating the workers demands economic organisation as well as political, the Socialist Labour Party endorses the new international union known as the Industrial Workers of the World and urges the members arid adherents of the Party everywhere to set up clubs for the spread of Industrial Union principles as a preliminary to the definite establishment of the I.W.W. in Great Britain.”—Socialist, May, 1906.

Leigh, interposing, said that at the meeting at the Communist Club an entirely different resolution was put.

Fitzgerald said they had to examine their position in regard to the organisation known as the I.W.W. A certain preamble was laid down in the constitution of that organisation which they were told was revolutionary. The question was raised at the last meeting whether this preamble did not denote a revolutionary organisation. He said, no. What were the constituents of the I.W.W. ? First, the Western Federation of Miners. He read from the stenographic report of the Chicago Convention which said :—-

“I am … a member of the Western Federation of Miners, a revolutionary industrial labor organisation. We have not got an agreement existing with any mine manager, superintendent or operator at the present time.” (Page I54.)

But the I.W.W. had agreements with certain people : Haywood said, “We are a revolutionary organisation,” yet in the industrial war in Colorado the Western Federation of Miners asked its members to vote for capitalist candidates after lessons against which Featherstone was child’s play. And the W. F. of M. formed the backbone of the I.W.W. ! They therefore had a rank and file not understanding Socialism adopting a Socialist preamble. They claimed that the L.R.C., although it had certain members Socialist, and had passed a resolution in favour of the Socialisation of production, was to be opposed. They had again from the stenographic report the following statement by Delegate Klemensic:

“We must not overlook the fact that we are here as working men, and as such we do not recognise the Socialist, the Anarchist, or any other kind of ‘ist.'” (Page 232.)

At that conference De Leon and others, all members of the S.L.P. and the S.T. & L.A., were present, and not a single one got up to deny that statement. Another man, Delegate Murtagh, said, referring to a clause in the Preamble:

“I think that this clause is just exactly the thing, and is born of exactly the same need that the old live trade unions mean when they say ‘no politics in the union’ . . . It is useless for us here to attempt to disguise this fact that we have every shade of political opinion. We have the Socialists—I happen to be one of them who believe thai action in the political line is absolutely necessary. We have the Socialist on the other hand, who is so near the Anarchist that he is beginning to think as the Anarchist does, that action along the political line is absolutely harmful instead of being useless.” (Page 228.).

Now several people had made an attempt to explain that. They could not do it, but had to talk about something that might occur in the future. That is what Murtagh did. Another delegate, Clarence Smith, said :

“It seems to me that this paragraph of the Preamble particularly is intended, not to represent the Principles and purposes of Industrialism, but represents a toadyism to three different factions in this convention. (Applause.) … It seems to me that this paragraph could not have been more involved or more confusing if it had been written by the platform committee of the Republican or Democratic party. . . It seems to me that this paragraph is intended to be such that the supporter of this movement can point to it when talking to a pure and simple unionist and say ‘that is just what you want and expresses what you believe in.’ I believe it is intended to be such that a Socialist can be pointed to this platform with the statement that ‘this is Socialism.’ I believe it is intended to be such that an Anarchist can be confronted with this platform and told that ‘this means Anarchy as it is written right in this paragraph.’ … I am going to talk to individuals wherever I find them for this movement, and I cannot afford to have Bro. De Leon along with me every time I meet a man to explain what this paragraph means.” (Pages 220—230.)

As Smith said, it meant all things to all men. He hoped a lot of them had read “What Means this Strike.” In that you had one of the clearest expositions of the Socialist attitude to an economic strike. Moreover, some of them had heard De Leon in London. He knew of no man who could put the Socialist principle simpler than De Leon. It could not be said he did not understand the position. Then why did he attempt to wangle round the Preamble of the I.W.W. when he said :

“I know not a single exception of any party candidate ever elected upon a political platform of the emancipation of the working class who did not sell them out as fast as elected (Applause). Now it may be asked, ‘that being so, why not abolish altogether the political movement ? Why at all unite the workers on the political field ?’ The aspiration to unite the workers upon the political field is an aspiration in line and step with civilisation. Civilised man, when he argues with an adversary, does not start with clenching his fist and telling him, ‘smell this bunch of bones.’ . . . He begins by arguing ; physical force by arms is the last resort. Civilised man . . . will always give a chance to peace. But civilised man, unless he is a visionary, will know that unless there is Might behind your Right, your Right is something to laugh at. And the thing to do, consequently, is to gather behind that ballot, behind that united political movement, the Might which is alone able when necessary to ‘take and hold.’ Without the working people are united on the political field; without the delusion has been removed from their minds that any of the issues of the capitalist class can do for them anything permanently, or even temporarily; without the working people have been removed altogether from the mental thraldom of the capitalist class, from its insidious influence, there is no possibility of your having those conditions under which they can really organise themselves economically in such a way as to ‘take and hold'”. (Page 227.)

For sixteen years the S.L.P. had been endeavouring to get on all the ballots on a revolutionary basis. Now we come to the statement that any man elected on that basis would be a suspicious character. That was the fact of the situation.

He said :

“If any individual is elected upon a revolutionary ballot, that individual is a suspicious character. (Applause). Whoever is returned elected to office on a program of labour emancipation ; whoever is allowed to be filtered through by the political election inspectors of the capitalist class, that man is a carefully selected tool, a traitor of the working people, selected by the capitalist class.” (page 226)

In other words he used the same argument as Jack Williams used to E. J. B. Allen in connection with the unemployed that it was necessary to go to the Government and ask for something to find that you would not get it ! We fight for control of political power because the armed forces of the capitalist class were controlled by the political party. It was a fallacy that an industrial organisation could take and hold anything which the capitalist would not allow you. They could blow you out of existence when they liked while they controlled those forces. He opposed the resolution.

Phillips said he rose to oppose both the resolution and the amendment. He thought Fitzgerald was wrong when he said that the man who went to the I.W.W. meeting and did not take a part in it was a fraud. He (Phillips) went with the idea of seeing that the organisation had a sound political basis and a sound economic expression. He took up the same position with regard to the resolution as he took up towards the I.W.W. They were bound to fight existing Trade Unions and organise the workers on the economic field but he did not think the Bexley resolution good enough because it would allow the members of the economic organisation proposed, to ‘monkey’ on the political field. Upon the political as well as on the economic they should have sound organisations supporting one another, and they should not allow any members to in any way support Capitalism on either field. He did not think a case had been made out for the doctrine of ‘permeation.’ Therefore they had to organise the workers in an economic organisation to which they could point the members of the political party. He believed, however, that the rank and file of the S.L.P. and of the S.P.G.B. were honest and consistent Socialists and that neither organisation had departed from the principles of revolutionary Socialism. The only point was that the S.L.P. had endorsed an organisation which would allow its members to take any action they liked on the political field. He claimed that when members of the S.P.G.B. joined with members of the S.L.P. to form an economic organisation without a clear political expression they were not holding correctly to their principles. But while the S.P.G.B. allowed its members to belong to unsound economic organisations like Trade Unions the Party itself was unsound.

A. W. Pearson said during the week he had picked up a copy of the Weekly People in which De Leon points out that the S.L.P. in America should dominate the S.T. and L.A., or the economic organisation. The economic organisation should now, however, dominate the S.L.P., yet the I.W.W. will accept any brand of politics. He supposed a member of the working class would come to an I.W.W. meeting and ask what political party he should join. Then they would have the members of all the political parties shouting at once and claiming that their party was the only one. Leigh was speaking about members of the S.L.P. being quite willing to throw over their leaders. The S.D.F. and I.L.P. members were also saying they only needed unity conventions of the rank and file to effect unity. The S.L.P. only existed in Scotland because the S.P.G.B. was not there. It was already dead in London. If they were going to have a Trade Union let them have one affiliated to the Party. They did not want men in a Trade Union under false pretences—men who would accept a preamble said to be Socialism but who were class-unconscious. At the bottom of the I.W.W. business was merely the old anarchist principle.

E. J. B. Allen said he noticed Fitzgerald laid great stress on what the I.W.W. delegates had said at its convention. If they were going to take the speeches of any individual delegate they could make a great deal out of any convention. Trouble had been made because there had been an economic organisation established without affiliation to a political party and he maintained that the Socialist organisation could be formed without affiliation. The l.W.W. Propagation Society was formed to propagate what they believed to be correct. Let them look at the so called contradictory statement of the I.W.W. Preamble. The party that stated “until they come together on the political field” could not be an anarchist organisation. He had never said that it was not necessary to capture the political machinery. How were they going to take and hold the means of production ? He had always held that it was impossible until the political power of the capitalist class was smashed. When the political power of the capitalist class was smashed they would no longer have use for it. Last Wednesday five-and-twenty men decided to start a propagandist organisation. Did that look like seeking after big numbers ? When at the first conference of the S.P.G.B. he moved the resolution to establish a Socialist Union when sufficient members had joined he did not get a seconder. There were men who saw that a political party not the expression of a sound economic organisation could never make any progress. The workers had to be drilled with an understanding of their economic position, and the best way of getting them to recognise their class interest was to organise them on that field where they came every day in direct conflict with the capitalist class. The propertyless class interest of the worker could only be reflected in the politics of Socialism. Till the workers were united on the economic field as a whole they would have several types of so-called Socialist parties. The organisation of the present political State was a direct negation of the organisation which would prevail under Socialism. Therefore it was necessary to organise them on that basis. Men who may come into an industrial organisation, even if they were ignorant, could not but come to have a clear expression of their economic class interest. Educational work could be done effectively from an economic organisation. A political party not backed up by an economic organisation was trying to rush ahead faster than the rest of the working class. If they had these various political parties fighting one another and claiming to be Socialist they could do nothing until they had a sound economic organisation of the working class. The Socialist Republic had got to live on its economic foundation, and until they had a political party representing an economic organisation their efforts would be futile. While claiming that they should continue their political propaganda, they should have a sound industrial organisation. He claimed they had a Socialist union even if it was not affiliated to the S.P.G.B. Whilst the S.P.G.B. may be claimed to be the only sound organisation it was another thing to claim that there were no sound Socialists outside that organisaton. There were men in the S.D.F. to-day still trying to pull the S.D.F. straight. Had we the greater interest of the S.P.G.B. before us or the interest of the working class ? If there were S.D.F. members saying and advocating that the only sound principle was that of uncompromising hostility to the whole of the capitalist class at all times there was no reason why they should not work with them. He would say to these men, are you in favour of an economic organisation based on the class struggle and aiming at the overthrow of the capitalist system ? And there were such men. He was willing to unite on that basis with any man with honest principles, believing that men in a straight economic organisation could not but take straight political action. If they said the unions must take up the Socialist position what organisation must be offered to them instead of the present unions ?

Anderson asked whether Allen knew that the only parts on the Continent where the Socialist Party had been successful was where the political party had dominated the trade unions.

Allen said the political parties, as far as he knew, never ran a trade union.

Jackson in reply said Allen thought it was necessary that an economic organisation should be formed for taking and holding the means of production. An economic organisation alone could take and hold nothing. The question was one of class consciousness. He did not accuse anyone of dishonesty. The point was were they mistaken or were they not ? When the working class became class-conscious then such a modification of their economic organisation would take place that the necessary correct action on both fields would be taken. The logical conclusion of the principle of the I.W.W. was Anarchism, the General Strike, and street riots. Only when the mass of the workers had been organised in a political party of the workers could sound progress be possible.

The amendment was carried by 25 to 18 and became a substantive resolution.

Here A. J. M. Gray had to leave and W. Gifford was elected to the chair.

Anderson moved to amend by substituting the words “wage workers” for “trade unionists,” which was carried.

The substantive resolution as amended was then put and defeated by 20 to 13.

The discussion was adjourned.

Letter: State Capitalism (2010)

Letter to the Editors from the January 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Dear Editors,

I read with interest your commentary on the socio-economic system that evolved in the former USSR in the November issue of  the Socialist Standard (“Workers State – Pull the Other One”). Absent was the discussion developed by the Socialist Labor Party of America that for me offers the clearest explanation (albeit of a muddled situation) of what happened, taking into account the Trotskyist, Maoist, (not mentioned in your commentary) and that of vanguardist apologentsia. The SLP study rejects the “state capitalist” appellation and concludes that the most accurate description is “bureaucratic state despotism”. As the pamphlet concludes:

“The mode of production Marx analyzed has a different mode of formation, different laws of operation and a different structure than the one in the Soviet Union. The effort to describe the U.S.S.R in terms of capitalist seems to be a substitute for making the same kind of thorough analysis of this new mode of production that Marx made of the dominant one of his day.” (page 46) 

This commentary can be found on line where the entire pamphlet can be read or downloaded.

Bernard Bortnick (by email from the US).

Reply:

As the article was a review of a book about the Trotskyist Ernest Mandel it is reasonable that it mentioned neither Maoist nor SLP theories of the nature of the former USSR. Russia could be described as having been a “bureaucratic state despotism” but that’s a political description that tells us nothing about the “mode of production” that existed there. The 1978 SLP pamphlet The Nature of Soviet Society you mention does go into this in more detail, arguing that what existed there was neither socialism nor capitalism nor a “workers state” but “a new class society based on state property”. But it did concede that “it is possible to attempt a Marxist analysis of the USSR and similar systems as state capitalist” and that “the most coherent state capitalist theories” hold that Russia can be termed capitalist “because the basic elements of the capitalist mode of production survive, though in modified form” and that these theories “point to the existence in the Soviet Union of wage labor, commodity production (i.e., production for exchange in a market), the extraction of surplus and its control by the state owners of productive property, the perpetuation of class divisions and state oppression”. Yes, precisely.

In theory Russia might have evolved into some new exploitative class society. The basic reason we described it as still being capitalist was the continued existence there of the wages system, the basis of capitalist exploitation, not to say of capitalism.

Editors.

Lives of the Left: Daniel De Leon (1990)

Book Review from the July-Aug 1990 issue of the Discussion Bulletin

Daniel De Leon by Stephen Coleman [Manchester University Press, "Lives of the Left" series] Manchester, England, 1990; cloth, 192 pp. U.S. readers see below for ordering information.

This volume differs from the two earlier De Leon biographies (Reeve 1972 and Seretan 1978) in that its author does not regard DeLeon's anti-reformist, anti-statist socialism as an aberration. Stephen Coleman'a political thinking derives from the same turn-of-the-century opposition to social democratic reformism from which De Leon and the post-1900 Socialist Labor Party sprang, and he can understand the political situation and the choices that faced the SLP and DeLeon.

Coleman has divided his book into eight chapters, which we can assume reflect his interests and concerns: The Enigma of Daniel De Leon, The Socialist Labor Party, Trade Unionism and the Abolition of the Wages System, the Battle against Reformism, De Leon and the Wobblies, The De Leon-Connolly Conflict, De Leon's Conception of Socialism, and the Last Years and Legacy of De Leon.

Part of the "enigma" Coleman sees is the irony that the man he characterizes as ". . . the most outstanding American thinker, writer, orator, and political organizer of the years from 1890 until the eve of the First World War" should be so hated by his contemporaries on the left and in the labor movement. In addition to a list of these historians of the Hilquit school of labor history, he points out what he calls ". . .  the legacy of contemporary vilification by the likes of Dubofsky et al., who have accepted without thought the prejudices of the Hilquitians."

In "The Socialist Labor Party" Coleman traces De Leon's influence on the SLP and the dynamics that brought about the 1899 split between the reformists and revolutionaries. As the European socialist parties of the Second International grew during the 1880s and 90s, the possibility of gaining political office and presumably bringing about socialism piecemeal through capitalisms political machinery became vary real. The success of "socialist' politicians in transforming the "immediate demands" of the socialist parties into their dominant programs caused splits in nearly all the parties of the Second International. In the U.S. the anti-De Leonists left to help form the Socialist Party identified with Hilquit, Debs, and Haywood. In Britain both the Socialist Party of Great Britain (to which Coleman belongs) and the British SLP left Hyndman's Social Democratic Federation. In Russia the situation produced the Menshevik-Bolshevik split and in France, Germany, the Netherlands, and elsewhere splits and factional disputes that were often resolved by events precipitated by the Russian Revolution.

In Coleman's judgment "The 1899 split was not essentially about specific SLP policies, but was a final effort by approximately half of its members to assert the compatibility between a socialist party and a possibilist [reformist] strategy or, conversely, to remove what they saw as the theoretical shackles of De Leon's uncompromising impossibilism." While recognizing that De Leon's confidence in his own wisdom and eagerness to combat error sight easily give rise to accusations of authoritarianism, he disposes of the charges of bossism by citing the record: ". . . De Leon enjoyed no power within the SLP to which he was not elected, and made no decisions alone but as a result of winning a majority."

The evolution of the SLP's position on unionism, which culminated in the organization of the Socialist Trades and Labor Alliance in 1895 was not, in Coleman's view, a sectarian plot by De Leon but had already been initiated in 1889 before De Leon joined the SLP by socialist trades unionists in Now York City, who had called for "New Trades Unionism' and split from the Central Labor Union to form the Central Labor Federation. Coleman sees the lack of success of the STALA as well as the isolation impossibilism entailed for the SLP as the reason behind De Leon's eager embrace of the IWW in 1905.

As one might expect, Coleman's SPGBist differences with De Leonism become clear in the chapter, "De Leon's Conception of Socialism." While giving De Leon credit for attempting to answer the hard questions workers ask about the nature of the new society, he expresses serious doubts about De Leon's answers, finding the source of much of what he considers the less desirable elements in De Leon's and the SLP's vision of the future society in Edward Bellamy's Looking Backward. He sees not only the idea of labor vouchers and of the socialism-in-one-country concept as arising from De Leon's association with Nationalism in the 1880s but the roots of the whole concept of socialist industrial unionism, which he relates to Bellamy's work-oriented, militaristic view of the social organization of the future. Coleman's conclusions here will offend not only the most orthodox of De Leonists but revisionists of various degrees as well. Space doesn't allow this reviewer to combat Coleman's findings. But we will find space for readers of the book to refute him.

Also offensive to some readers will be the final chapter in which, among other things, he examines what he regards as De Leon's efforts to break out of the isolation that anti-reformism (impossiblism) imposed on the SLP. These included the embrace of the IWW and its reformist SP contingent and the 1905-8 unity effort, which culminated in his Unity address. Interestingly Coleman presents Reinstein as De Leon's ally in 1908, not his enemy as official history suggests. He rather decently finds De Leon not guilty of the official SLP's claim [charge?] that his writings influenced Lenin. The final chapter also contains an interesting section on the differences between the British and American SLPs. Part of De Leon's legacy is the SLP. Here is Coleman's verdict: "De Leon stamped his authority upon the SLP because he was the party's most able and active thinker. That De Leon’s comrades offered him such deferential respect . . .  respect created a tradition that was abused terribly by the less intellectually vivacious, sterile dogmatists who succeed the De Leon role."

Although there are a couple of flaws—De Leon was referring in Reform or Revolution to the future socialist society, not the party of socialism, with his illustration of the orchestra director—, Coleman has done his reading and his research. Indeed this is a political biography in the finest sense of the term. Coleman in not a De Leonist and his critical stance and political differences are apparent, as indeed they should be. But I think that De Leon would not have wished for a fairer, wittier, more sympathetic treatment from a political opponent. We can only assume that had Coleman been afforded more time and more pages, he would have modified his views on Socialist Industrial Unionism.

Like all books worth reading, the price is steep even for a clothbound book. U.S. readers can obtain the book directly from St. Martin's Press for $29.95 or send a 25-cent stamp to DB for a flier that offers a 20 percent discount making the price $23.95.

Frank Girard

Marx, Lenin and Industrial Unionism. (1930)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1930 issue of the Socialist Standard

Armley, Leeds.

Dear Comrades,

In your review of Clausen's book in June S.S. you state that Clausen does not show how the economic organisation can "take and hold" ; nor did De Leon. How did De Leon come to epitomize that statement which you point out Marx never made about the economic organisation, as being '' typically Marxian"? (p. 37 "Industrial Unionism”).

In ''The Revolutionary Act" Engels says (p. 20), "History has proved us wrong," and advocated political supremacy rather than armed insurrection. '

He also says, "The irony of history turns everything upside down."

This implies change of opinion, and if Engels could change from advocating barricade tactics to that of the ballot, might he not change his opinion again if alive to-day, and give same countenance to Industrial organisation?

Did De Leon "forge" the "link" between Marx and Engels and present Industrial development ?

The backwardness of Russian Industrial development precluded Lenin from applying Industrial Unionism, which, it is reported he said was "the Basic thing," and that "De Leon first formulated the idea of a Soviet Government which grew from his idea."

Will you please give your opinion as to why Lenin thought Industrial Unionism was the "Basic thing"?

Yours fraternally,

H. Scott.

 

Reply:

Marx versus Direct Action.

The above letter illustrates how easily critics dodge the question at issue. Neither our critic nor De Leon, nor anybody else, has been able to show that Marx held that the workers could only win possession by economic action. We have once again to remind critics that Marx's essential point was that the workers must first of all win political supremacy. Both Marx and Engels waged continuous war against Bakunin, who advocated economic action as the only way.

De Leon's gymnastics.

Daniel De Leon, however, held quite a number of conflicting ideas as to the nature of the Marxian method. De Leon's and the S.L.P. 's first economic child—the Socialist Trade and Labour Alliance—laid it down in their Declaration of Principles that "the economic power of the capitalist class, used by that class for the oppression of labour, rests upon institutions essentially political."

Explaining the policy of that body, De Leon in What Means this Strike declared : —

“Shop organisation alone, unbacked by that political force that threatens the capitalist class with extinction, the working-class being the overwhelming majority, leaves the workers wholly unprotected.”

In his " Two Pages from Roman History," De Leon said: —

“Obviously, independent class conscious action is the head of Labour's lance. Useful as any other weapon may be, that weapon is the determining factor.

Entrenched in the public powers, the capitalist class command the field. None but the political weapon can dislodge the usurpers and enthrone the working-class : that is to say, emancipate the workers and rear the Socialist Republic.” (Italics ours.)

When, however, De Leon and Co.'s next economic child was born he discovered another alleged "typically Marxian" position which is completely opposed to the statements just quoted. The Industrial Workers of the World, formed in 1905, had a platform which stated that the taking and holding of the means of life must be done by an economic organisation without affiliation to any political party.

De Leon, in his address "The Preamble of the I.W.W.," said:—

“It does not lie in a political organisation, that is. a party, " to take and hold " the machinery of production ; 

And he tells us in the same work : —

“In the act, however, of taking and holding the nation's plants of production the political organisation of the working-class can give no help.”

The anti-political views of De Leon were made clear at the first convention of the I.W.W. in his speech : —

“The situation in America . . . establishes the fact that ‘the taking and holding’ of the things that labour needs to be free can never depend upon a political party. If anything is clear in the American situation it is this : That if any individual is elected to office upon a revolutionary ballot, that individual is a suspicious character. Whoever is returned elected upon a programme of labour emancipation ; whoever is allowed to be filtered through the political inspectors of the capitalist class : that man is a carefully selected tool, a traitor to the working people, selected by the capitalist class. (Report, p. 226.)

A favourite phrase of De Leon's was that the day of political victory was the day of defeat unless the workers had the economic might to enforce their political victory.

De Leon and Marx.

Our critic asks if De Leon forged a link between Marx and Engels and present industrial development.

If, as our critic claims, De Leon's position was "typically Marxian," why forge a link to put it right? Modern industrial development has shown the overwhelming importance of political power and the weakness of the workers on the economic field. Riddles such as what opinions Engels would hold if he were alive to-day may provide amusement but it is for our critic and those agreeing with him to show that the views of Engels in 1895 (See " Class Struggles in France ") are out-of-date to-day.

Why chase the shadow?

The S.L.P. position led logically to Anarchism, for if politics was a shadow and a reflex only, as they claimed, and if the real power lay on the industrial field, why bother with shadows, and why not go in for the substance of economic action? And that is what happened. The Industrial Workers of the World took De Leon at his word and concentrated on industrial organisation.

Then De Leon and the S.L.P. gave birth to a third economic child (in 1908) made up of the minority of the I.W.W., which was called the Workers' International Industrial Union, but after a flicker of life it went the same way. Like all industrial organisations it was compelled to enrol workers of all political opinions, and so the members who were united industrially were fighting each other politically.

After its organisers, etc., had supported the freak parties called Socialist, the Industrial Union refused to endorse its parent— the S.L.P., and so the third economic child was buried quietly by the S.L.P.

Lenin the next witness.

Our correspondent asks why did Lenin say that Industrial Unionism is the basic thing?

The only information on the point is the reference by two journalists to Lenin's remark to them about De Leon after he had seen some of De Leon's writings in 1919, Did Lenin make use of or actually support Industrial Unionism? There is not a scrap of evidence to prove that. The Socialist Labour Party pointed out that the workers of Russia were not organised in industrial unions and their National Secretary, Arnold Peterson, after pointing that out, concluded in the following words : ''So long as the Bolsheviki were in opposition it was doing excellent agitational work. Now that it is in power it faces failure. The day of its victory was the day of its defeat." (Weekly People, Nov. 24th, 1917.)

The "basic thing" that Lenin referred to was the organization by industry instead of by territory. Nowhere did Lenin support the chief idea of the Industrial Unionists that they could take and hold by economic means alone, and nowhere did he embody it in Third International policy.

On the contrary, in his "Open letter to the I.W.W.," Lenin attacks their Anarchist idea of relying upon economic action.

In actual practice Russia's government was not an industrial government chosen from the industries but simply an ordinary party government—that of the Communist Party.

Lenin and the Third International advocated many policies from open violence and insurrection to support of a Labour government. From minority action to going with the "Labour" masses. Certainly industrial unionism was not one of them. Lenin found that Russian workers organised in trades and economic bodies were using their organisation in hostility to the wider interests of society as a whole (see "Soviets at Work" and Phillips Price "Capitalist Europe v. Soviet Russia"), and he had to curb their narrow industrial actions.

Soviets or councils were old in the history of Russia and did not need De Leon or Lenin to invent them.

Lenin had to teach the same lesson that Marx taught, that the control of the State power was the essential thing. So neither Marx nor Lenin nor Engels assists our critic in his support of industrial unionism.

Why do our critics not attempt to show how unionism of any kind is the might that can take and hold the means of life?

Adolph Kohn

Party News: Ukraine (2003)

Party News from the September 2003 issue of the Socialist Standard

In this column in March we reported that a party had been formed in the Ukraine with the same object and declaration of principles as us,

It now turns out that a hoax was involved, part of an elaborate scam to extract money from political groups in  Europe and North America to finance the activities of a Trotskyist group in the Ukraine (a sister organisation of Militant in this country in the so-called "Committee for a Workers International"). Members of this group would contact groups in the West by email feigning agreement with the latter's political positions. Money sent ended up in the coffers of the Trotskyist group. At least ten groups seem to have been taken in by this scam including, besides ourselves, the SLP of America, the Socialist Studies group, and various rival Trotskyist outfits to Militant.

We know that vanguardist groups resort to underhand tactics as a matter of principle but this is a particularly devious example.

Letter to The Western Socialist (1973)

From issue number 2 (1973) of The Western Socialist

Dear Sir:

I received and thank you for your letter, and the copies of “The Western Socialist." You wrote in the letter. “ . . . we insist that the image De Leonism holds of the nature of a socialist society is not consistent with revolutionary Marxism."

In the program, “Stravinsky Remembered," on WGBH-TV on Feb. 26, when someone accused the distinguished composer, the late Igor Stravinsky, of changing his mind on an important matter, Stravinsky replied that he had not changed his mind, but that he had gained additional knowledge. Thus, it was with De Leonlst and pre-De Leonist Marxism; and, thus, the Socialist Labor Party can call itself Marxist as well as De Leonist.

In your "The Western Socialist," No. 4 — 1967, article, “The Socialist Labor Party & Religion.“ you quarrel with the views of the SLP in regard to religion. If I should want to learn the facts about plumbing, I would speak to a plumber; if I desire to learn the facts about Socialism, I consult a true Socialist; and if I wish to learn about religion. I similarly would consult a clergyman. Karl Marx is not a proper person to consult about religion. He was an expert in regard to economics, true; but he had little if any Insight into the true meaning of religion, as he was not a devout believer in any religion. As did many German Jews of the time. Marx's family, for reasons of expediency alone, had renounced its Jewish religious heritage, and had ostensibly adopted Christianity. Therefore, Marx was neither devout nor warmly devoted as a Jew or as a Christian; and, therefore, he cannot well be considered an authority in regard to the nature and meaning of religion. Marx’s words on economics bear truth and authority; his words on religion are merely his unfounded personal opinion.

The World Socialist Party Declaration of Principles, number six, states, in part: "The working class must organize consciously and politically for the conquest of the powers of government." When you advocate "conquest of the powers of government." without utilizing the country’s electoral process of the ballot, you become unjustifiable, and thus conspiratorial, subversive, and beyond the law. This is not true of the Socialist Labor Party.

As for your organizing “consciously." you will agree that the workers are mere wage slaves; and. thus, they are subject to the crippling and emasculating evil effects of the slavery. Aristotle wrote: “The slave has no deliberative faculty at all; the woman has, but it is without authority; and the child has, but it is immature . . slaves stand even more in need of admonition than children." ("Politics:' Bk. I: Ch. 13.)

I believe this to be the chief obstacle to the success of the Socialist Movement of today. This does not mean that the Socialist Movement cannot succeed, but that it must grow through its assimilation of additional and more fundamental knowledge.

The French philosopher and author, Jean Jacques Rousseau, wrote: "Our country cannot well subsist without liberty, nor liberty without virtue.”

Finally, Frederick the Great, King of Prussia, stated: "A man that seeks truth and loves it must be reckoned precious to any human society.”

I remain,

Sincerely yours,

Louis Frankel 

Response:

The copies of The Western Socialist to which our correspondent alludes had articles dealing with the Socialist Labor Party in which the following points, among others, were demonstrated:

(1) The SLP picture of socialism in operation, viz an "industrial union government,” is not in harmony with the goal of scientific socialism.

(2) The SLP attitude on Religion. i.e., that it is a "private matter” is inconsistent with an understanding of the Marxist Materialist Conception of History.

Mr. Frankel chose to ignore the other points and to answer the first with a quotation from Igor Stravinsky, the second with that old saw about the cobbler sticking to his last, and bolster his overall weak case with citations from the writings of others that are strictly in the category of non sequitors.

(1) To begin with, the gaining of additional knowledge and its application is fine providing such knowledge is not in conflict with one's original intentions. The aim of world socialism (and socialism on a national level is a bad dream) is the abolition of class society and the ending of the nation state. The goal of DeLeonlsm is the changing of governments, congresses and parliaments from geographical to an industrial union orientation. Not that the SLP is altogether consistent or sound on that policy, either, as their long drawn confusion over the nature of the Soviet economy and sympathy with it bear witness. [1] World Socialism must bring with it the change of government. itself, into an administration over the affairs of man, rather than over man, himself. And such a society could only bring with it a condition in which the very need of unions - of any sort — would be inconceivable

(2) The Marxist Joseph Dietzgen, in the Preface to his The Positive Outcome of Philosophy had an apropos answer to this gem of wisdom, to wit:

“If any one should feel justified in telling me: 'Shoemaker, stick to your last!’ I would reply to him with Karl Marx: 'Your non plus ultra professional wisdom became enormously foolish from the moment when the watchmaker Watt invented the steam engine, the barber Arkwright, the loom, the jeweller Fulton, the steamship.' “

But to believe that one must be a clergyman to understand the origins and purposes of Religion is truly to have the faith "of a little child” which is what, the clergy is wont to tell us, is needed to accept the Scriptures. We do not know whether or not Mr. Frankel is actually a member of the Socialist Labor Party but we must note that his faith in the word of "God” as relayed by the various clergy is not inconsistent with membership in that organization and it speaks volumes for the "scientific” attitude of the American DeLeonists.

And now Mr. Frankel leaves the area of defense and goes on the attack! He notes that our Principle No. 6 calls for conscious and political conquest of the powers of government, suggests that we do not call for the utilization of the "electoral process of the ballot.” and charges us with being “conspiratorial.” Alas. The superficiality of his study of socialism, generally, is only matched by the lack of attention he gave our journals in particular. We have never advocated any other means to our end but the ballot (although we never support non- or anti-socialist candidates or measures). In fact, one of our Party Rules states emphatically that one who advocates violence in the struggle for socialism cannot be a member of the World Socialist Party.

Nor does he help his case against us by quoting Aristotle. For Aristotle lived in a different era, an era in which slaves were not a potentially revolutionary class, a class that could have an interest in a higher society. It is a different story with the slaves of capitalism, the wage slaves. They are the "grave diggers" of capitalism and of class society in toto. Chattel Slave society, under which Aristotle lived, was a dead end social system that was by no means universal at the time and which created no revolutionary class. But just as Feudalism created the instrument of its own overthrow—the bourgeoisie—so has Capitalism created its own revolutionary class, the modem proletariat, or working class. Mr. Frankel’s problem is that he has his eras mixed. In fact, he might find it profitable to spend more time on the socialist classics than he seems to spend with classical and bourgeois philosophers.

Harry Morrison

[1] See the Western Socialist, No. 6—1962.

Frank Girard: In Memorial (2004)

Obituary from the April 2004 issue of the World Socialist newsletter

. . . I was deeply saddened to hear last month of the passing of Frank Girard, the long time editor of the publication. Frank stopped publishing the Discussion Bulletin in July 2003 citing his age and the increasing importance of the internet, which he felt made publications like the Discussion Bulletin less and less relevant. He planned continued involvement in the socialist movement. His death at 77 is a felt loss to his many friends and comrades.

Frank worked as a machine operator and later a high school English teacher, but more important was his membership from the 1940s on in the Socialist Labor Party, the organization of followers of American socialist leader Daniel De Leon. Frank ran for political office several times in Michigan, but argued he was "running against capitalism." Unsurprisingly, he was never elected.

In the early 1980s, as part of a seemingly endless series of schisms in the SLP, Frank was expelled from the party along with much of the Grand Rapids section (in 1991 he published a short history of the party along with another former Socialist Labor Party member Ben Perry). In 1983, Frank began to publish the Discussion Bulletin.

The Discussion Bulletin was unlike many other socialist publications in that it was simply a forum for discussion. Its contents were, aside from Frank's editorial remarks and occasional contributions, entirely from its readership. It was also a model of regularity for socialist publications, appearing every two months like clockwork for twenty years. Frank's other strength was that he was genuinely committed to discussion and debate in what he called the non-market socialist sector, in which he included De Leonists, World Socialists, council and left communists, and class struggle anarchists among others. Throughout its existence the Discussion Bulletin featured, unedited, contributions from all of the above sectors. And although he never completely broke with De Leonist politics and all its incumbent weaknesses, but which had played such an important role in his life, Frank was also prepared to learn from discussion, and admit when he was wrong. Frank was a non-sectarian in the best sense of the word . . .

The cessation of publication by the Discussion Bulletin left a hole. Frank's passing leaves a much larger one.

Neil F. /Red & Black Notes