working class in this campaign and the only party that has a moral right
to appeal to the allegiance and support of the workers and producers of
the nation.
I am not asking you to give your votes to this party but only that you
read its platform, study its program, and satisfy yourselves as to what
its principles are, what it stands for, and what it expects to
accomplish.
The Socialist party being the political expression of the rising working
class stands for the absolute overthrow of the existing capitalist
system and for the reorganization of society into an industrial and
social democracy.
_Death to Wage-Slavery._
This will mean an end to the private ownership of the means of life; it
will mean an end to wage-slavery; it will mean an end to the army of the
unemployed; it will mean an end to the poverty of the masses, the
prostitution of womanhood, and the murder of childhood.
It will mean the beginning of a new era of civilization; the dawn of a
happier day for the children of men. It will mean that this earth is for
those who inhabit it and wealth for those who produce it. If will mean
society organized upon a co-operative basis, collectively owning the
sources of wealth and the means of production, and producing wealth to
satisfy human wants and not to gorge a privileged few. It will mean that
there shall be work for the workers and that all shall be workers, and
it will also mean that there shall be leisure for the workers and that
all shall enjoy it. It will mean that women shall be the comrades and
equals of men, sharing with them on equal terms the opportunities as
well as the responsibilities, the benefits as well as the burdens of
civilized life.
The Socialist party, the first and only international party, is rising
grandly to power all around the world. In every land beneath the sun it
is the party of the dispossessed, the impoverished and the heavy-laden.
It is the twentieth century party of human emancipation.
It stands for a world-wide democracy, for the freedom of every man,
woman and child, and for the civilization of all mankind.
The Socialist party buys no votes. It scorns to traffic in ignorance. It
realizes that education, knowledge and the powers these confer are the
only means of achieving a decided and permanent victory for the people.
_A Clean Campaign._
The campaign of the Socialist party is a clean campaign; it is
essentially educational; an appeal to intelligence, to manliness, to
womanliness, and to all things of good report.
The workers are opening their eyes at last. They are beginning to see
the light. They are taking heart of hope because they are becoming
conscious of their power.
They are rallying to the standard of the Socialist party because they
know that this is their party and that here they are master, and here
they sit at their own political hearthstone and fireside.
No longer can the workers be pitted against each other in capitalist
parties by designing politicians to their mutual undoing. They have made
the discovery that they have brains as well as hands, that they can
think as well as work, and that they do not need politicians to advise
them how to vote, nor masters to rob them of the fruits of their labor.
Slowly but surely there is being established the economic and political
unity and solidarity of the workers of the world. The Socialist party is
the political expression of that unity and solidarity.
_Unity the Keynote._
I appeal to the workers assembled here today in the name of the
Socialist party. I appeal to you as one of you to unite and make common
cause in this great struggle.
To the extent that you have made progress, to the extent that you have
developed power, and to the extent that you have achieved victory, to
that extent you are indebted to your own class-conscious efforts and
your own industrial and political organization. To the extent that you
lack power, to the extent that you are defeated and kept in bondage, to
that extent you lack in economic and political solidarity.
Rightly organized and soundly disciplined on both the economic and
political fields, the working class can prevail against the world.
The economic organization and the political party of the working class
must both be revolutionary and they must work together hand in hand.
Industrial unionism means industrial solidarity, but craft unionism
means division and disaster. The printing trades pitted against each
other in Chicago in their struggle with the newspaper trust furnish a
fatal illustration of the weakness and treachery of craft division in
the present industrial conflict.
_The Workers of Milwaukee._
The workers of Milwaukee have to an exceptional extent overcome the
obstacles to unity and have worked together with signal success on both
the economic and political fields. I appeal to them in the name of the
future to get closer and closer together in the bonds of economic and
political solidarity. If they do this their complete and final victory
is assured.
The Socialist party of Milwaukee has marched steadily to the front since
it first began its career. Its latest defeat was its greatest victory.
It forced the Republicans and Democrats to unmask and to fly into each
other's arms. There is no Republican or Democratic party in Milwaukee.
They are dead, and in the coming election their remains, masquerading as
a party of the people, will be buried by the Socialist party.
_The First Congressman._
The Socialists of Milwaukee will always have the distinction of having
elected the first representative of the working class to the congress of
the United States. Victor L. Berger has made good at Washington. For
the first time since he is a member the voice of labor has been
distinctly heard on the floors of congress, and in every emergency when
the working class needed a champion at the seat of power, they found him
ready and eager to espouse their cause and defend their interests.
It was to defeat Berger's re-election that the Republicans and Democrats
in Milwaukee combined, just as they did to defeat Emil Seidel for mayor
and drive the Socialist administration from power.
But Berger is making a record at Washington and the Socialist
administration made a record in Milwaukee that will stand the test of
time, and if the workers now rally their forces in support of Berger, he
will be triumphantly re-elected against the combined opposition of the
old parties, and in the next municipal election the City of Milwaukee
will be permanently restored to a Socialist administration.
Comrades, you are face to face with the greatest struggle you have ever
had since the Socialist party was organized. You are now to be tested in
every fiber as to your fitness to hold the ground you have gained and to
press on to greater victories. May you be permeated to the core with the
spirit of the Socialist movement and enter the fray resolved that
victory shall be inscribed upon your banners.
_Ettor and Giovannitti._
I must not fail in the presence of all these workers to speak of Joseph
Ettor and Arturo Giovannitti, the leaders of the Lawrence strike, who
are in prison and soon to be tried upon the charge of murder, of which
they are as innocent as if they had never been born.
This infamous charge has been trumped up against them by the defeated
mill owners for no other reason than that they stood up bravely and
fought successfully against great odds, the battles of the wage-slaves
of the mills. Unless the workers unite in support of these two leaders
they may be sent to the electric chair. Should we suffer these brave
comrades to fall victims to such a monstrous crime, it would be a foul
and indelible blot upon the whole labor movement. Let us arouse the
workers of the nation in their behalf and prove to them when their trial
takes place that we are as true to them as they were to the wage-slaves
in the industrial battle at Lawrence.
_Comrades, this is our year!_ Let us rise to our full stature, summon
our united powers, and strike a blow for freedom that will be felt
around the world!
CAPITALISM AND SOCIALISM.
Campaign Speech, Lyceum Theatre, Fergus Falls, Minn., August 27, 1912.
Friends and Fellow-Workers: The spirit of our time is revolutionary and
growing, more so every day. A new social order is struggling into
existence. The old economic foundation of society is breaking up and the
social fabric is beginning to totter. The capitalist system is doomed.
The signs of change confront us upon every hand.
Social changes are preceded by agitation and unrest among the masses. We
are today in the transition period between decaying capitalism and
growing Socialism. The old system is being shaken to its foundations by
the forces underlying it and its passing is but a question of time. The
new system that is to succeed the old is developing within the old and
its outline is clearly revealed in its spirit of mutualism and its
co-operative manifestations.
For countless ages the world has been a vast battlefield and the
struggle for existence a perpetual conflict. Primitive peoples were
compelled to fight nature to extort from her the means of livelihood.
Since the forces of nature have been conquered and nations have become
civilized the struggle of men is no longer to overcome nature but with
one another for existence.
In this struggle which has appealed to the basest and not to the best in
man the cunning few have triumphed and now have the masses at their
mercy. These few are closely allied in, their economic mastery as they
are also in their control of the political machinery. Their money and
their mercenaries controlled the Republican convention at Chicago, wrote
its platform and dictated its nominees, and the same is true of the
Democratic convention at Baltimore.
As for the so-called Progressive convention, it is sufficient to say
that there is no attempt to conceal the fact that it was financed and
controlled by three conspicuous representatives of the plutocracy which
largely owns and rules the land.
Political parties are responsive to the interests of those who finance
them. This is the infallible test of their character and applied to the
Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties, these parties stand
forth as the several political expressions of the several divisions of
the capitalist class. The funds of all these parties are furnished by
the capitalist class for the reason, and only for the reason, that they
represent the interests of that class.
Professional politicians of whatever party are very much alike and in
one respect at least they are like workingmen, they serve the interests
of their masters, and for the same reason.
The patriotism of professional politicians is reflected in the material
interests of the master class and this fact has become so apparent that
their noisy theatricals have lost their magic and now excite but the
scorn and derision of intelligent working men and women.
The Republican, Democratic and Progressive conventions were composed in
the main and controlled entirely by professional politicians in the
service of the ruling class.
There were no working men and no working women at the Republican
convention, the Democratic convention, or the Progressive convention.
These were clearly not working class conventions. Ladies and gentlemen
of leisure were in evidence at them all. Wage-slaves would not have been
tolerated in their company. They represented the wealth and culture and
refinement of society and they were there to applaud and smile approval
upon the professional politicians and patriots who were doing their
work.
But there was a fourth convention held this year which did not attract
the wealthy and leisure classes. It was a convention great in purpose,
though not big in numbers. This convention was held at Indianapolis and
represented the working class. The delegates who composed this
convention were chosen by the workers and paid by the workers to
represent the interest of the workers and to clear the way for the
workers in the present campaign.
The Socialist convention was the only democratic convention and the only
progressive convention held this year; the only convention that
represented a dues-paying party membership and whose acts before
becoming effective must be ratified by a referendum vote of the party.
The Socialist party is the only party in this campaign that stands
against the present system and for the rule of the people; the only
party that boldly avows itself the party of the working class and its
purpose the overthrow of wage-slavery.
So long as the present system of capitalism prevails and the few are
allowed to own the nation's industries, the toiling masses will be
struggling in the hell of poverty as they are today. To tell them that
juggling with the tariff will change this beastly and disgraceful
condition is to insult their intelligence. The professional politicians
who have been harping upon this string since infant industries have
become giant monopolies know better. Their stock in trade is the
credulity of the masses.
The exploited wage-slaves of free trade England and of the highly
protected United States are the victims of the same capitalism; in
England the politicians tell them they are suffering because they have
no protective tariff and in the United States they tell them that the
tariff is the cause of their poverty.
And this is the kind of a confidence game the professional politicians
have been playing with the workers of all nations all these years. To
keep them in subjection by playing upon their ignorance is the rule that
governs their campaigns for votes among the workers. The "issues" upon
which they keep the workers divided into hostile camps are of their own
making.
Since the foundation of the government one or the other of these
capitalist parties has been in power and under their administration the
working and producing millions have been reduced to poverty and slavery.
Professor Scott Nearing has shown in his work on the wages of American
workers that half of the adult males of the United States are earning
less than $500; that three-quarters of them are earning less than $600
a year; that nine-tenths of them are receiving less than $900 a year,
while 10 per cent only receive more than that figure.
Professor Nearing also shows the starvation wages for which women are
compelled to work in the present system. One-fifth of the whole number
of women workers receive less than $200 per year; three-fifths receive
less than $325; nine-tenths receive less than $500. Only one-twentieth
of the women employed are paid more than $600 per year.
These figures bear out the report of the Chicago vice commission to the
effect that the low wages of women and girls go hand in hand with
prostitution. Despite all attempts to control the white slave traffic,
which is now organized as one of the great profit-extorting trusts,
along with the rest of the trusts, prostitution, like a terrible cancer,
is eating out the very heart of our civilization.
And in the presence of this appalling condition the professional
politicians prattle about tariff revision and indulge in silly twaddle
about currency reform and regulation of the trusts.
The Socialist party is absolutely the only party which faces conditions
as they are and declares unhesitatingly that it has a definite and
concrete plan and program for dealing with these conditions.
The Socialist party as the party of the exploited workers in the mills
and mines, on the railways and on the farms, the workers of both sexes
and all races and colors, the working class in a word, constituting a
great majority of the people and in fact THE PEOPLE, demands that the
nation's industries shall be taken over by the nation and that the
nation's workers shall operate them for the benefit of the whole people.
Private ownership and competition have had their day. The Socialist
party stands for social ownership and co-operation. The one is
Capitalism; the other Socialism. The one industrial despotism, the other
industrial democracy.
The Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties all stand for private
ownership and competition. The Socialist party alone stands for social
ownership and co-operation.
The Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties believe in regulating
the trusts; the Socialist party believes in owning them, so that all the
people may get the benefit of them instead of a few being made
plutocrats and the masses impoverished.
The Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties uphold the wage
system; the Socialist party demands its overthrow.
It is under the wage system that the 22,000 operatives in the cotton and
woolen mills at Lawrence, Massachusetts, have been compelled to work, or
slave rather, according to Commissioner Neill, for an average of $8.76
per family. To earn this average wage, according to the commissioner's
official report, requires the combined service of father, mother and
three children. This is slavery with a vengeance. The mill is a
sweat-hole; the hovel a breeding-pen. Home there is none. And there
never will be under the wage system.
What have the Republican, Democratic and Progressive parties to offer to
the wage-slaves of Lawrence, to the wage-slaves of the steel trust, to
the wage-slaves of the mines, to the wage-slaves of the lumber and
turpentine camps of the South, the wage-slaves of the railroads, the
millions of them, male and female, black and white and yellow and brown,
who produce all this nation's wealth, support its government and
conserve its civilization, and without whom industry would be paralyzed
and the nation helpless? What, I ask, has any of these capitalist
parties, or all of them combined, for the working and producing class in
this campaign? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
These parties are bidding stronger than ever for the labor vote this
year. That vote is now not so easily delivered as in the past. The
competition for the votes of the wage-workers is the distinguishing
feature of the present campaign. Thousands of workers are now doing
their own thinking. They have discovered that workers are as much out of
place in a capitalist party as capitalists are in a workers' party. They
have also found that politics express class interests and that the
interests of those who make the wealth and those who take it are not
identical. That is where the Socialist party comes in and where the
workers come in the Socialist party.
The working class is in politics this year. It has always been in
politics for its master; this year it is in politics for itself.
The most promising fact in the world today is the fact that labor is
organizing its power; its economic power and its political power.
The workers who have made the world and who support the world, are
preparing to take possession of the world. This is the meaning of
Socialism and is what the Socialist party stands for in this campaign.
We demand the machinery of production in the name of the workers and the
control of society in the name of the people. We demand the abolition of
capitalism and wage-slavery and the surrender of the capitalist class.
We demand the complete enfranchisement of women and the equal rights of
all the people regardless of race, color, creed or nationality. We
demand that child labor shall cease once and forever and that all
children born into the world shall have equal opportunity to grow up, to
be educated, to have healthy bodies and trained minds, and to develop
and freely express the best there is in them in mental, moral and
physical achievement.
We demand complete control of industry by the workers; we demand all the
wealth they produce for their own enjoyment, and we demand the earth for
all the people.
CONTENTS
MISCELLANY
Page
The Old Umbrella Mender 9
The Secret of Efficient Expression 15
Jesus, the Supreme Leader 22
Susan B. Anthony 29
Louis Tikas 33
The Little Lords of Love 37
The Coppock Bros 39
The Social Spirit 51
Roosevelt and His Regime 55
Industrial and Social Democracy 73
A Message to the Children 76
Social Reform 89
Danger Ahead 89
Pioneer Women in America 95
SPEECHES
Unity and Victory 107
Political Appeal to American Workers 132
The Fight for Freedom 152
Capitalism and Socialism 167