that it largely accounts for their almost instinctive hostility to new
kinds of political change. The roots of politics have been uncovered,
the change has in fact been made once for all--so they reason. To admit
that any new fundamental alteration is necessary is to be disloyal to
the historical liberation. Because the conservative American believes
himself a complete democrat, because for him the “new order” was
achieved in 1776, he is intolerant of modern radicals. Suggestions of
new revolution touch him closely on his pride. In this sense Jefferson
has been less a spur to future generations than an obstacle. If his
fine frenzy about rights had been less eloquently expressed, if it had
not obscured in a cloud of glory the true nature of the foundation of
our government--a highly practical compromise which embodied a few
moderate advances and many hesitancies--we should have a different
temper about change to-day. We should not assume that all desirable
fundamental modification of social and political structure had been
completed nearly a century and a half ago.
The greatest historic expression of American radicalism has thus
become the altar of the conservatives. To the unlettered man it
may seem strange that a Supreme Court of elderly radicals will not
allow Congress to forbid child-labour because of their loyalty to an
18th-century limitation of the federal government, presumably in the
interest of freedom and humanity. To workmen voting for the eight-hour
day the language of Jefferson did not seem hostile--they were
struggling to pursue happiness in a way that he must have approved.
And yet it is the sacred “right” of contract which deprived them, as
voters, of the right to legislate for shorter hours. Workmen using
their collective economic power to gain industrial freedom are met by
a shower of injunctive denials, based chiefly on that same right of
contract. In order to stay any further liberation of the human body
and spirit, judges and officials and industrial barons have only to
invoke the phrases of freedom thrown out against an ancient despotism.
They have only to point out that freedom as defined abstractly over a
hundred years ago forbids practical freedom to-day. Frozen radicalism
of the past chills and destroys the new roots of American life.
Some appreciation of this state of affairs underlies the prevailing
tendency to believe that all new radicalism has a foreign origin. It
is, indeed, part of the best nationalistic tradition to attribute
subversive doctrines to foreigners. This is the habit in every country.
But in the United States the habit is perhaps more deep-seated than
elsewhere. Americans are by definition free and equal; if then any one
talks or acts as if he were not free and equal, he must have been born
somewhere else. The American Government, being not a faulty product of
human growth, but a new creation sprung perfect out of the ineffable
minds of the Fathers, is unassailable; if any one assails it, he
cannot know it, and must be subjected to courses in English and Civics
(Americanization) until he recognizes its perfection. Treason in this
country is not simple treason to a ruler, to a class, or to a system
as elsewhere; it is an act of sacrilege, by one uninitiated, upon a
religious mystery.
Of course there are and have been Americans whose radicalism is less
crust and more meat. The spirit of Jefferson still lives, after all, to
confute the interpretation put upon his words. And imported doctrine
has actually had less to do with most of the radical movements in
America than has American tradition itself. It is an easy step from the
conception of political liberty to the conception of economic liberty,
and the step has been made here as readily as in Europe. In a country
which for so long offered extraordinary opportunities to the individual
business man, it is only natural that economic liberty should have been
conceived as a means of protecting his enterprise; and as a matter of
fact our economic legislation for many years has been sprinkled with
victories of the small business men and farmers over the interests
which had already become large enough to seem to them oppressive.
The regulation of the railroads, the succession of popular financial
doctrines, and the anti-trust legislation, were all initiated by the
interpretation of economic democracy naturally arising in the vigorous
class of the small entrepreneurs. With the slow weakening of this class
by its disintegration, on one hand into captains and lieutenants of the
great principalities of industry, and on the other into permanently
salaried or waged members of the rank and file, comes a corresponding
tendency to change the prevailing conception of economic democracy.
The radicalism of workmen in the United States has often been no less
sweeping or assertive than the radicalism of workmen anywhere--witness
the I.W.W. Even violence in the labour struggle has been practised
chiefly by one hundred per cent. Americans--the steel workers in
Homestead in 1892 and the West Virginia miners in Mingo County in 1921
were of old American stock. And the moment the predominating group
in American thought and activity is composed of those who expect to
live by their daily work rather than of those who expect to accumulate
property, we are likely to see the rise of an economic radicalism more
akin to that which exists in Europe, and one which, because of its
sanction in our tradition, will be twice as militant and convinced.
For, after all, economic radicalism arises neither from a merely stupid
desire for more material goods, nor from an intellectual adherence
to a particular formula of industrial organization. It arises from a
desire to be free, to achieve dignity and independence. Poverty is
distressful not so much because of its physical hardships as because
of its spiritual bondage. To be poor because one chooses to be poor is
less annoying than to be moderately paid while the man who fixes one’s
wages rides in a Rolls-Royce. The most modest aspects of the labour
movement are attempts of the workmen to gain some voice in determining
the conditions under which they must work--in other words, to extend
democracy into industry. And when the workman wakes up to the fact
that industrial policies are governed by a comparatively small class
of owners, and that the visible result of those policies seems to be a
large class of underemployed, undernourished, and under-housed families
on one hand, and a small class of abundantly supplied families on the
other, he feels that he is suffering an indignity. You may challenge
him to prove that any other system would work better. You may argue
that if all the wealth of the rich were distributed equally, he would
receive but a trifle. Such reasoning will affect him little. If every
one must be miserable, he at least wants to share and exercise whatever
power exists to alter that misery. Kings have argued that the people
could rule no better than they, but that has not prevented peoples from
demanding representative government. The American tradition is sure to
be as subversive a motive in industry as it has been in the State. The
technical problem of how industry may be better organized, important as
it is, is subordinate to this cry of the personality. Essentially, this
sort of radicalism arises from the instinct of the workman to achieve
an adult relationship to the industrial world.
The impact of the war upon industry, and the reverberation of its
social results abroad, for some time stimulated this latent feeling
in American workmen. For the first time in decades the competition
of the unemployed and the immigrant was virtually removed, and the
wage-earner began to feel secure enough to assert his personality. He
was necessary to the community in an immediate way. The policy of the
government was to recognize this fact, and to prevent an unduly rapid
increase in wages and in the power of organized labour by compromising
with it on certain simple issues like collective bargaining and the
eight-hour day. But larger aspirations arose in the rank and file, and
when the Russian Revolution sent a word of emancipation around the
world, they were ready to listen. In spite of the crushing force of
the whole ruling propaganda machinery, which had been so successful in
arousing hatred against Germany, countless American workmen sensed the
approach of a new order as a result of the success of the Bolsheviki.
A secondary impulse of the same sort, felt even more strongly in
some quarters, arose from the Nottingham programme of the British
Labour Party. But affairs moved slowly, hope was deferred, and at
length the new spirit lost much of its freshness and power. The very
acrimoniousness and volume of the controversy over what had or had
not been done in Russia wearied most people of the whole matter. The
many expected revolutions in other countries, which missed fire so
many times, caused disillusionment. The doctrinaire and even religious
adherents of the Russian Communists began to make trouble for every
radical organization in the country by their quarrels and divisions. At
length, the war being over, the American labour movement itself began
to display a weakness in the face of renewed attack on the part of its
opponents, which showed how illusory had been many of its recent gains
and how seriously its morale had been injured.
Economic radicalism never looked--on the surface--weaker than it does
in the United States to-day. On the strength of statements by Mr.
Gompers and some other leaders of the trade unions, we are likely to
assume that organized labour will have nothing to do with it. The
professed radicals themselves have been weakened by dissensions and
scattered by persecution. Yet a brief survey of the formal groups which
now profess radical theories will indicate why the future of American
radicalism should not be assessed on the evidence of their present low
estate.
The Socialist Party, even more than the Socialist Parties in other
countries, was placed by the war in a difficult situation. With its
roots not yet firmly in the soil, except in a few localities and
among diverse national elements, it was faced with the necessity,
in accordance with its principles and tradition, of denouncing the
entrance of the United States into hostilities. But this decision
could command no effective support from the workers organized on the
economic field, who under a different leadership adopted a different
attitude. Nor was the party strong enough among any other element of
the population to make its decision respected. The only immediate
result of the gesture was therefore to place this unarmed little force
in the most exposed position possible, where it drew the fire of all
those who were nervously afraid the people would not sanction the war.
Socialism was not judged on the basis of its economic tenets, but was
condemned as disloyal and pro-German; and the effect was to render the
party even more sectarian and unrepresentative than ever before. It had
adopted a position in which it could not expect recruits except from
moral heroes, and no nation nourishes a large proportion of these. Such
episodes make good legend, but they do not lead to prompt victories.
Even those who later have come to believe that the Socialists were
right about the war are likely to express their belief in some other
form than joining the party.
In this weakened condition, the Socialist Party after the war developed
internal fissures. Many bitter words have been exchanged as to whether
the “Left Wingers” were or were not a majority of the party, whether
they were or were not more orthodox than those in control of the party
machinery, and whether, if they were more orthodox, their orthodoxy was
wise. At any rate, they broke away and formed two new parties of their
own, a fact which is the chief point of interest to one who is more
concerned with the larger issues of American radicalism than with the
minutiæ of Socialist politics. The Communist Party and the Communist
Labour Party, whatever may have been the legitimacy of their gestation
in the bowels of Socialism, certainly found their reason for being
chiefly in logic which originated in Moscow and Berlin rather than in
the American situation. At once selected for persecution by government
officials, they burrowed underground, doubtless followed by a band of
spies at least as numerous as they. From these subterranean regions
have come rumours of a fourth party--the United Communist, which
swallowed most of the Communist Labourites and some of the Communists.
At last accounts the Communists and the United Communists were each
attempting to prove the other counter-revolutionary by reference to the
latest documents from international revolutionary headquarters.
It is hazardous in the extreme for an outsider to speak of the
differences in doctrine among these groups. It is probably fair to
say, however, that the Communist parties are chiefly distinguished by
their total lack of interest in anything save a complete revolution,
because this is the only kind they believe possible. They reject
as “compromises” partial gains of all sorts; piecemeal progress by
evolutionary methods rather offends them than otherwise. Their eyes
are turned always toward some future revolutionary situation; for
this their organization and their theories are being prepared. This
being the case, the validity of their position will be tested by the
event. If, as the milder Socialists believe, economic changes may come
gradually by process of growth and smaller shocks, the Communists are
likely to remain a nearly functionless and tiny minority, even in the
labour movement. If, as the Communists believe, the present order in
the normal course of its development is destined to experience a sudden
collapse similar to that which occurred in Russia near the end of the
war, they will become the true prophets, and their mode of thought and
action will presumably have fitted them to assume leadership.
The Farmer-Labour Party is a recent growth far less doctrinaire than
either the Socialist or the Communist groups. It has neither prophet
nor Bible, but is based rather on the principle of gathering certain
categories of people together for political action, trusting that
as they become organized they will work out their own programme in
relation to the situation, and that that programme will develop as time
goes on. The categories to which it appeals are chiefly the industrial
workers and the small farmers, who have in general common economic
interests as opposed to the large owners of land and capital. It hopes
that other elements in the population, realizing that their major
interests are much the same as those of the unionists and the farmers,
will join forces with them to produce a majority. As an illustration
of the operation of such tactics, the Farmer-Labourites point to
the success of the Independent Labour Party of Great Britain, first
in aiding the foundation of the British Labour Party, and second in
building up for that party an increasingly coherent radical programme.
In all these cases, however, not much confidence is placed in the
actual political machinery of elections. There is a widespread
scepticism about the ability to accomplish industrial changes by the
ballot, on account of experience with political corruption, broken
election promises, adverse court decisions, and political buncombe
in general. These parties are formed as much for the purpose of
propagating ideas and creating centres of activity as for mobilizing
votes. All radical parties lay great stress on the industrial power
of the organized labour movement. This is not to say that they do not
recognize the importance of the State in industrial matters. All agree
that control of political machinery will in the long run be necessary,
if only to prevent it from checking the advance of the people through
the courts and police. But they also agree that control of the State
is not held and cannot be attained by political machinery alone. The
present influence of the proprietors of industry on politics is due,
they see, chiefly to economic power, and the workers consequently
must not neglect the development of their own economic organization.
The Communists are completely hopeless of attaining results through
the present election machinery; the Socialists and Farmer-Labourites
believe it possible to secure a majority at the polls, which may
then execute its will, if the workers are well enough organized for
industrial action.
Outwardly the most successful of the radical movements is the least
doctrinaire of all. It is unnecessary to repeat the history and
achievements of the Nonpartisan League--an attempt on the part of
organized farmers to use the machinery of the State in order to
gain economic independence from the banking, milling, and packing
interests. Other groups of farmers have aimed at a similar result
through co-operation, with varying success.
In the industrial labour movement proper there have been numerous
radical minorities. The most uncompromising of these, as well as
the most characteristically American, was the Industrial Workers of
the World, who aspired to build up a consciously revolutionary body
to rival the unions composing the American Federation of Labour.
This decline is due not so much to suppression as to their previous
failure to enlist the continued support of the industrial workers
themselves. Like the Communists, the I.W.W. predicated their success
on a revolutionary situation, and lacking that situation they could
not build a labour movement on an abstract idea. Over long periods not
enough people are moved by a philosophy of salvation to give staying
power to such an organization in the daily struggle with the employers.
Other similar attempts, such as the W.I.I.U., and the more recent One
Big Union, have encountered similar difficulties. They grow rapidly in
crises, but fail under the strain of continued performance.
The failure of American radicals to build up a strong movement is in
part due, of course, to the natural difficulties of the social and
economic situation, but it is also due to the mental traits which
usually accompany remoteness from reality. This is illustrated in
the history of the I.W.W., if we accept William Z. Foster’s acute
analysis. The regular trade-union movement, slowly evolving towards
a goal but half consciously realized, overcoming practical obstacles
painfully and clumsily, as such obstacles usually are overcome, was too
halting for these impatient radicals. They withdrew, and set up rival,
perfectionist unions, founded in uncompromising revolutionary ardour.
These organizations were often unable to serve the rank and file in
their practical difficulties, and consequently could not supplant
the historic labour movement. But they did draw out of that movement
many of its most sincere and ardent spirits, thus depriving it of the
ferment which was necessary to its growth. The I.W.W., for their part,
failing to secure any large grip on reality, regressed into quarrels
about theory, suffered divisions of their social personality, and
at length--except in the far West--became little more than economic
anchorites. As Foster says, “The I.W.W. were absolutely against
results.”
Too much of American radicalism has been diverted to the easy
emotional satisfaction which is substituted for the arduous process
of dealing with reality. We suffer a restriction of the personality,
we cry out against the oppressor, we invent slogans and doctrines,
we fill our minds with day dreams, with intricate mechanisms of some
imaginary revolution. At the same time we withdraw from the actual
next step. Here is the trade-union movement, built up painfully for
over a century, a great army with many divisions which function every
day in the industrial struggle. How many radicals know it in any
detail? How many have paid the slightest attention to the technique
of its organization, or have devoted any time to a working out of the
smaller problems which must be worked out before it can achieve this
or that victory? Here are our great industries, our complex systems
of exchange. How many radicals really know the technique of even the
smallest section of them? Radicals wish to reorganize the industrial
system; would they know how to organize a factory?
If radicalism arises from the instinct for economic maturity, then it
can find its place in the world only by learning its function, only
by expressing its emotion in terms of the actual with which it has to
deal. A period of adolescence was to be expected, but to prolong the
characteristics of that period is to invite futility. And as a matter
of fact American radicalism now exhibits a tendency to establish more
contacts with reality. Instead of withdrawing from established unions
to start a new and spotless labour movement, radicals are beginning to
visualize and to carry out the difficult but possible task of improving
the organization of the existing unions, and of charging them with new
energy and ideas. Unions which were founded by radicals--such as the
Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America--are devoting their efforts not
to talking of a future revolution, but to organizing the workers more
firmly in the present, to establishing constitutional government in
industry through which tangible advances may be made and safeguarded,
and to improving the productivity of industry itself. Engineers,
encouraged by labour organizations, and in some cases actually paid
by them, are investigating the problem of economic waste, and are
demonstrating by line upon line and precept upon precept how the chaos
of competition, industrial autocracy, and a controlling profit motive
are reflected in idle hours, low wages, high prices, and inferior
products. The co-operative movement is slowly providing a new and
more efficient machinery of distribution, while co-operative banks
are building up a reserve of credit for those who wish to experiment
with undertakings conducted for other purposes than the profit of
the proprietor. Such functional use of the labour movement is more
dangerous to the existing disorder than volumes of phrases or a whole
battalion of “natural rights.”
Extremists call such activities compromise. They are compromise in the
sense that any hypothesis must be changed to fit the facts, but they
involve no compromise with scientific truth. The alchemist compromised
when he gave up the search for the philosopher’s stone and began to
learn from the elements. He surrendered a sterile dogma for a fruitful
science. In proportion as radicals learn how to put their emotions to
work, in proportion as they devise ways to function in the world in
which we live, will they make possible not only unity among themselves,
but a rapprochement with other Americans. A man who believes there is
no real possibility of change short of complete revolution can unite
with a man who has no theory about the matter at all so long as they
do not discuss abstract doctrine, but concentrate upon the problem of
how to bring about a particular effect at a particular time. The most
radical theories, if expressed in terms of concrete situations, will be
accepted by those who are wary of generalities, or do not understand
them. The theories will be tested in the fact. The operation of such a
process may be blocked by those who dogmatically oppose all experiment,
but in that case the forces of reason and of nature will be so clearly
on the side of the radical that there can be no doubt about his
ultimate fruitfulness.
GEORGE SOULE
THE SMALL TOWN
America is a nation of villagers, once remarked George Bernard Shaw
in a moment of his most exclusive scorn for what he believed was our
crude and naïve susceptibility to the modes and moods, to say nothing
of the manners, of the professional patriots during that hectic period
when Wilhelm was training to become the woodman of Amerongen. Now Shaw
is the oracle of the Occident, and when he speaks there is no docile
dog this side of Adelphi Terrace presumptuous enough to bark. At least
there should not be; and in any event, neither history nor H. G.
Wells records any spirited protest on America’s part to the Shavian
accusation. It was allowed to stand invulnerable and irrefutable. Of
course, in our hearts we know Shaw is right. We may for the moment
be signifying _rus in urbe_, but between you and me and the chief
copy-reader of the Marion (Ohio) _Star_, _in urbe_ is a superfluous
detail.