COUNCIL GOVERNMENT
From its present position and at its present pace the Weimar
Parliament will never overtake events. I remember once as a boy
pointing out to a cavalcade in red coats jogging along a by-lane that
the hunt was off in a different direction.
"The hounds, you mean," said an old gentleman severely; "we are the
hunt," and they all jogged happily on.
Meantime the dogs of war--of civil war between the constitutional and
council movements, between Conservatives and Communists--are still
running at a fearful pace and quite out of hand. The workmen will not
work unless some real socialisation is introduced, and this is only
possible if more steam be brought into the political machine than the
parliamentary system can raise. Socialisation and reconstruction have
been going back, not forward. The Socialisation Commission and the
responsible Minister have both resigned, because Weimar would not
give effect to their mildly socialistic recommendations. Yet nothing
can save Germany from bankruptcy and Bolshevism but a re-energising
and reorganising of the people for peace at least as effective as that
they underwent in the war. Nothing can do this but a new ideal and new
institutions. And the ideal of direct political power for the workmen
and the institution of an industrial councils system is, so, far as I
can see, alone capable of drawing out such force as is still left and
of driving the country through the slough of war weariness and waste.
The Councils movement in Germany, at first, followed much the same
course at much the same pace as it did in Russia. In Germany, as in
Russia, the Councils, after reaching at a bound the sole power during
the days of revolution, relapsed under a re-assertion of Parliamentary
and Party government; then recovered, and, in the case of Russia,
realised the second revolution. The German movement was last spring
(1919) in the early stage of recovery. Its development is of special
interest to us, in that eventually the German movement will probably
take a middle place between the Russian and our own.
Before the revolution the Labour movement in Germany was very much in
the same condition as with us. The attempt to combine on a patriotic
platform all productive forces, and to concentrate Capital and Labour
on winning the war, had only superficially smoothed over the distrust
between Employers, Associations and Labour organisations, or the
dissension between heads of unions and the bodies of workers. When the
revolution broke out on November 9th it was carried through first by
committees of sailors, then of soldiers, and finally of workmen, that
sprang up simultaneously and assumed supreme authority. The advent of
this new authority, however, brought about an alliance between the
previous authorities thus put on one side, the Employers' Associations
and the Trades Unions.
The employers, who had hitherto been resisting claims for an
eight-hour day and a share in control, found themselves threatened
with expropriation. Under the leadership of a Captain of Industry,
Hugo Stinnes, they at once opened negotiations with the Unions led by
Legien; and by November 15th reached agreement on the eight-hour day
and the establishment of Labour Associations (_Arbeitsgemeinschaften_)
equivalent to our Whitley Councils, and Labour Chambers
(_Arbeitskammern_), for dealing with wages and welfare, in which
employers and employed would have equal representation.
As Dr. Reichert, spokesman for the metal industries, has pointed out
to his supporters, these concessions looked more than they were. For
the eight-hour day would have to be abandoned unless, as was unlikely,
it became general in Europe; and as to the associations, it should
always be possible to get in and bring over a "Christian"
representative of one of the Labour organisations under the influence
of the Catholic Centrum. It is this agreement, none the less, between
the Trust and Trade Union bosses that is the basis of the present
Coalition Government's Labour policy, and that is embodied in the new
Constitution.
But, since the revolution, the real Labour movement of Germany has
passed to the "Councils" (_Raete_), as we must call them for want of a
better word. For "moot" is too archaic and "committee" suggests either
a party of bores and busybodies or a _posse_ of Bulgarian brigands;
while Soviet, which is only the Russian for Council, would mean
branding the movement as "Bolshevist."
Of these Councils then, the three main divisions in Germany are
Workmen's Councils (_Arbeiterraete_), or Industrial Councils
(_Betriebsraete_), Soldiers' Councils, and Communal Councils. Of these,
the first only seem to have a constitutional future in Germany.
The Communal Councils have not yet been fully admitted to the Council
system, and seem to have but little vitality.
The Soldiers' Councils, which played the more prominent part in the
revolution, and still form part of the organisation, have not
succeeded in making headway against the efforts of the Government to
demobilise them. Thus a regulation of January 19th reduced them to
welfare committees and restricted their right of deposing officers to
a mere recommendation. Attempts of the more revolutionary corps to
resist authority in December, January and March were put down by the
Frei-Corps with excessive and progressive severity; and the large
bodies of revolutionary troops that survived the demobilisation, as
"Republican Guards," "Public Safety Guards," "People's Naval
Division," &c., &c., have been gradually dispersed by the Government's
Frei-Corps.[F] So that the Soldiers' Councils as the political organ
of the revolutionary fighting forces are losing their importance. Now
that the British Admiralty have recognised "welfare committees" in the
Navy, it is safe to assert that the Council movement in Germany so far
as concerns the armed forces is no longer in advance of ours.
Returning, therefore, to the Industrial Councils, we find that in the
early days of the revolution the movement spontaneously developed an
organisation consisting of a national Central Council, elected by a
national Congress of Councils, in its turn elected by local Executive
Councils. These were all political institutions, which for a few days
enjoyed entire political power. This power passed back to the old
political Parties and Parliamentary system, owing to the Council
accepting as "Commissaries of the People" Parliamentary politicians,
whose sole idea and secret intention it was to reconstitute a Cabinet
and reconstruct a Chamber on reformed but not revolutionary lines. The
capital error was in trying to realise the revolution by only
establishing revolutionary bodies--the Councils--in supervision of,
instead of in substitution for, politicians and officials of the old
_regime_. This was the cause of the relapse into reaction.
The real revolutionaries realised this mistake and Liebknecht, after
accepting office, withdrew and joined the Communists and
"Spartacists." The Communists were and are, of course, "whole-hoggers"
in the Council movement, whose war cries are, "All power to the
Soviets" and "Down with the Assembly." The Independents ranged from
men like Ledebour, Daeumig and Richard Mueller, who saw in the Councils
the salvation, not only of the revolution, but of civilisation, to men
like Haase, Cohn and Breitscheidt, who believed that Parliamentary
democracy and proletarian dictatorship could be co-ordinated. The
Social-Democrats ranged from members of the Council organisation, who
believed that the Councils should have economic functions, and who
were last summer coming over to the Independents, down to men like
Legien, who would abolish the Councils as a revolt against the Trade
Unions, or Noske, who would abolish them as rebels against authority.
The Democrats included intellectuals, who recognised the political
utility of the Councils, but consisted mostly of Liberals with no
appreciation for them: though many of these latter had been coming
over to the idea, as, for instance, the veteran economist, Brentano,
or the internationalist, Schucking.
Owing to a tactical blunder of the Independents, the Central Council,
as well as the Cabinet of Commissaries, came under the sole control of
the Social-Democrats, the Trade Unions, and Moderate Socialists.
Consequently, the Central Council, instead of being the citadel of the
Council system, became a salient from which the enemies of the system
could undermine its whole position.
The Central Council, pursuing the Government's policy that all power
in the hands of revolutionary authorities must be surrendered to the
parliamentary institutions, in February publicly and formally
recommitted its mandate, whatever that might be, to the Assembly. One
might have supposed that this solemn suicide of its central authority
would have been the end of the Council movement. But exactly the same
surrender of the Central Council occurred at a similar stage of the
Russian revolution, with the result, not that the movement collapsed,
but that control of it passed from the Socialists to the Communists.
This seems likely to be the result in Germany. The first consequence
of the abdication of the Central Council was that leadership passed to
the Executive Council of Berlin, where the Independents and Communists
were already in a majority. The Executive Council proceeded to press
for a convocation of the Congress of Councils, and thereby a
re-election of the Central Council. The latter procrastinated, but
gave way on the Executive Council threatening to convene the Congress
itself, but even then succeeded in having it postponed more than
once.
Now, while the Opposition was moving to the Left in attempts to
realise the revolution, the Government was moving to the Right, and
rapidly restoring the old Police-State behind a facade of
parliamentary institutions. The consequence was a growing
dissatisfaction with the Government, which, for want of proper
expression through the Council organisation, broke out in periodic
strikes and street fights. These were exploited by the Government as
excuses for repressive and reactionary measures, which all contributed
to reinforcing the Council movement. It was the vicious circle that we
in England have come perilously near more than once.
The defection of the Central Council also resulted in depriving the
whole Council movement of any stability and solidarity, and drove it
into local offensives or "_putsches_," which were beaten in detail.
First Bremen and the coast ports, then Dusseldorf and the coal area,
next Saxony and the industrial districts, and finally, in the first
week of March, Berlin itself, all declared general strikes in which
recognition of the Council system was the principal demand. And the
Berlin strike, following close on that of Saxony, did frighten the
Government into what might have been a considerable concession.
As late as the end of February the Government had declared
semi-officially that no member of the Government had the slightest
intention of having the Council system incorporated in the
Constitution either legislatively or administratively; but two days
after the outbreak of the Berlin strike, early in March, the
Government announced, not only the socialisation of mines but the
sanction of the Council system in the Constitution.
The first Government scheme for organising the Councils was of much
the same character as the socialisation that it promised at the same
time--an elaborate organisation of Factory Councils, Industrial
Councils and Labour Chambers with "economic functions"; which all
boiled down to little more than the "Whitley Council" principle
previously proposed and rejected by the workmen. Since then the
Government has had to concede more, and Art. 165 of the Constitution
as signed in August, recognises the Workmen's Councils without
representation of the employers, though they have to associate
themselves with employers' representatives in order to discharge their
constitutional functions. Thus associated they can intervene in social
and economic legislation through a Central Economic Council. But it
was clear that neither this nor any other concession likely to be made
by the Assembly would satisfy the workmen. A bi-cameral system might
have done so, but this the Coalition Government could never have
imposed on its Centrum and middle-class supporters.
The best chance of arriving at a compromise between Parliamentary and
Council government was through the Congress of Councils which at last
met in Berlin in May.
This Congress had also another function of the first importance. It
afforded the only gauge available as to the velocity and volume of the
revolutionary revival. The Assembly at Weimar was in this, as in most
respects, useless. The Press was so coloured by class and party
feeling as to be quite unreliable. While owing to general
disorganisation of the country and the disintegrated nature of the
revolutionary movement the leaders of it themselves did not know what
their forces were. All that was known was that there had been a steady
defection from the Majority Socialists supporting the Government and
the Parliamentary system to the Independents, in opposition, who
advocated a combination of Parliament and Councils; and from the
Independents to the Communists, who were for "all power to the
Councils."
So steady had this leftward flow been that probably the Congress, if
left to itself, would have reflected it by coming together with a
majority for the Opposition. It would then have been able to begin at
once its function of elaborating a suitable compromise between
Parliament and Councils. For it is to be assumed that the Communists
and the right Majoritarians would have been each in a small minority,
with an absolute majority for delegates representing the Independent
position. That this was, at the time, the prevalent opinion in the
movement is suggested by the delegates from German-Austria associating
themselves with the Independents.
However, partly for the better preservation of party, power, and
place, partly from the pressure of constant "officious" admonitions
from us that peace would only be made with a parliamentary government,
the German Government did their best to falsify the character of the
Congress and get as many Majority Socialists into it as possible by
hook or crook. The hook used was a new electoral arrangement prepared
by the Central Council which most of the great towns rejected. In
some, as in Breslau, the delegates first elected were recalled, and
real workmen's representatives substituted. And when the Government
found its lost sheep weren't coming home, like Bo-peep, it took its
little crook, determined for to find them; and found them indeed, but
with the historical result. For if by hook and by crook you make
workmen's delegates of country lawyers or country magistrates you
cannot expect them to bring much of a working-class tail behind them.
So when the Council came together it was distinctly rather
parliamentarian than proletarian in its character. But if the
Government's object was to cripple and control the Congress it failed.
Because the first result of their gerrymandering was that the
Communists refused to take part, thereby greatly facilitating the
subsequent _rapprochement_ between the two Socialist factions, the
Majority and the Independents.
The Congress, when it met, was found to consist of 130 Majority
Socialists, 64 Independents, 20 soldiers' representatives, and about
80 miscellaneous and absent; and of these quite a large number were
not working men at all. But all the same the difference between the
atmosphere of Parliamentary and Council government at once appeared
when it got to work. For this much gerrymandered and very jerry-built
Congress showed itself capable of adapting itself to pressures in a
way that the National Assembly could not. It showed itself to be a
real deliberative body, capable of coming rapidly to a joint decision
radically different from the several views subscribed by its
individual members before its meeting. In other words, the Congress
had vitality enough to make its constituents real representatives
instead of merely instructed delegates. Its response to the general
trend of opinion to the Left and against "Government by the
Frei-Corps" was shown by its first vote which, by 199 to 81 called for
the release of Ledebour, an Independent "intellectual" imprisoned for
alleged complicity in the January disorders. This was followed by a
vote of congratulation to Hungary; while a similar congratulation to
Bavaria, where a "Council Republic" had just been proclaimed, was very
properly postponed as prejudging the whole question of Council
government that was before the Congress.
The first days were passed in general debate, during which much
negotiation between section leaders and a general alignment of forces
were going on in the lobbies. A fictitious interest was given to this
work of "realising the revolution" by the Congress having met in the
Herren-Haus, the old Prussian House of Lords, the shrine of reaction.
It was piquant to see a fervent Majority Socialist and a fiery
Independent discussing whether Parliament and universal suffrage were
not irretrievably reactionary, under the cold marble nose of a
Prussian Princelet who had looked on them as the ultimate Chaos and
Dark Night of Revolution. But as will be seen, the _genius loci_, won
in the latter end.
The Congress took some days in making up its mind what line to take.
The Majority leaders did not know which way to turn, associating
themselves when they could with attacks on the Government, and when
they could not, apologising. For though the Independents on one side
and the small Democratic section on the other were disciplined bodies,
the Majoritarian bloc was disorganised. When it came to a vote they
obeyed the whip, but many slipped out, and the vote was very different
from what was expected.
The Government's advisers in politics and in the Press, finding that
so far from bringing over the Independents to the Government the
Congress was fast drawing the Majority into opposition, strongly
recommended the Government to close the Congress on the ground that it
was only wasting time in futile and inflammatory agitation. The
Independents countered this by forcing an immediate issue on the main
question--the constitutional recognition of the Council system.
The opening of the discussion showed that a majority of the Congress
favoured a combination of Parliament and Councils in which the latter
should have political as well as economic functions. Whether the
Majoritarian leaders in the Congress were genuinely convinced of the
necessity of giving the Council system recognition or whether they
were forced to compromise in order to retain command of their
followers, and through them control their following among the workmen,
I do not know. Anyway, after a series of speeches, in which the
Majoritarian leaders, Kalinsky and Cohn-Reuss, vied in concessions, a
compromise was put forward that represented practically the position
held by their opponents the Independents a few weeks before. The
compromise between the Parliamentary system and Council system they
proposed was probably workable; though arrived at from an unsound
position--that of regarding the Central Council as a controlling
authority over the National Assembly; whereas it would really be
supplying the driving power and the Assembly the brake.
Now, although the Independents, for the same tactical reasons that had
driven the Majoritarians to the Left, were now proclaiming the
principle of "all power to the Councils" (which had been until then
the position of the absent Communists) they were rather embarrassed at
finding themselves "Bolshevists," explicitly demanding the
dictatorship of the proletariat. The spring running of German
politics to the Left had been so headlong that the parliamentarian
leaders of the Left had had to sprint hard to keep ahead of their
followers. But if they had kept one eye anxiously gauging the pace of
the avalanche surging at their heels they had kept the other guessing
no less anxiously at the position of the abyss of "Bolshevism" ahead.
And small wonder if they were a little bewildered and out of breath.
For as late as December they had been still accepting the Assembly as
the sole executant of the revolution, and looking on the Councils as
practically extinct and politically eccentric. By January they had
been forced to accept the Councils as a fact that had to be fitted in
somehow. In February their periodicals were full of schemes for giving
economic powers to the Councils, while reserving all political power,
national and provincial, to the Assemblies. By March they had
recognised that they must have political power as well and by April
they had reached the compromise of a bi-cameral constitution now
adopted by their conservative opponents, the Majoritarians. And now,
in order to clear the leftward road for the Majoritarians and keep
pace with the Communists, old parliamentary hands, like Haase, Oscar
Cohn and Breitscheidt, found themselves condemning their newly born
and much beloved parliamentary democracy to be smothered in its cradle
for the benefit of a Bolshevist changeling. No wonder they were ready
to join forces with their Socialist comrades of the majority in a
compromise which found a place for their firstborn the Weimar
Parliament and for their familiar world of party politics.
Thus the Socialist parties, still hopelessly divided in that cold
storage of faction, the Weimar Assembly, had been re-fused and
re-moulded by the volcanic fires of the Congress.
One Sunday afternoon, after the Congress had been a week at work, I
heard that the leaders of these two sections had that morning
privately agreed to reconstitute the Central Council on a principle of
parity, _i.e._, twelve Majoritarians and twelve Independents, with a
few Democrats and soldiers.
This private agreement, unreported until after it had been repudiated,
was a political event of an importance second only to the revolution
itself. It reunited the Socialist party on a platform of realising the
revolution through the Council system by constitutional action. The
Congress of Councils, for whose dissolution the whole Press were
clamouring openly and every secret sinister influence was conspiring,
had in six days gone further towards the reconstruction and
re-orientation of Germany than Weimar had in six months.
But one obvious result of this new alliance between Majoritarians and
Independents in the Council system would have been the jettisoning of
Majoritarian Ministers, such as Noske, Landsberg and Scheidemann,
compromised by their complicity with reaction and the brutalities of
the Frei-Corps. It was therefore not surprising that the full force of
party pressure and of administrative authority was brought to bear on
the Majoritarian parties to the agreement. Under this pressure, like
good citizens and genuine Germans, they buckled up and broke down,
repudiating the principle of parity. They offered instead a proportion
of fourteen Majoritarians to ten Independents in the Central Council
or a representation corresponding to the numerical proportion of
parties in the gerrymandered Congress. These offers were refused, the
Congress came to an end, and the pusillanimity and place-hunting of
parliamentary politicians had ruined the revolution a second time. The
first was when the Independents, under pressure from the Left,
withdrew from the Coalition with the Majoritarians in December. The
second was when the Majoritarians, under pressure from the Right, now
in their turn withdrew from the reconstituted Coalition in May.
The Council was reconstituted with Majoritarians, and the Independents
were thrown back upon the Communists and "direct action." The only
course then left to the adherents of the Council movement was to
perfect their organisations and wait until parliamentary government
was overthrown, either by reaction or revolution. The first essential
for such organisation was a general electoral system which would put
the Councils on a regular basis and prevent such interference and
intrigues as had preceded the previous Congress. The last meeting that
I attended of the Plenary Assembly of Berlin Councils, the driving
body of the movement, was occupied with discussing the crucial
question as to who should be considered a workman and qualified to
vote and stand for a Council. It was there tentatively agreed that a
workman might have a few assistants without becoming an employer, and
that scientists, experts, and such like connected with an industry,
other than managers, directors and such, might count as workmen. On
the other hand the Assembly had to adjourn for a time in disorder
owing to protests against the presence of a police official as a
delegate of the Democrats. It was clearly going to be difficult to
express in terms of an electoral law a disability obvious enough in
each individual case. The German workmen were ready to admit to
equality anyone with any industrial productive status, who was not in
the service of declared enemies of the Councils--such as the captains
of industry or the Coalition Government. And so important is this
suffrage question as a gauge of the liberality of the Council movement
in Germany and of its distinction from Bolshevism, that I append as a
footnote the regulation of the Berlin Executive Council, published
previous to the Convention of the second Congress of Councils.[G]
This work of making the Council system really representative has been
much hampered of late by the growing reaction which is still trying to
break the neck of the movement by arresting its leaders, and impeding
its development in every way. At the same time, schemes are being
continually put forward by the less reactionary elements for drawing
the teeth of the movement by "diddling" concessions. Among such may be
counted the clauses "anchoring" the Councils in the Constitution. The
word itself shows how rapidly the German politicians are picking up
the devices of parliamentary democracy. Again and again, on the
platform and in the Press, the workmen are assured that all is well
with the Councils because they are "anchored" in the Constitution.
What the workmen want is not to see them "anchored" so much as under
way; but it is creditable diddling is that catchword, "anchored in the
Constitution." And another diddling device is the electoral law
advocated by the Majoritarians that the Government are trying to
impose on the Councils, which would penetrate the movement with
propertied interests and partition it up into regional areas.
Of late, indeed, the Council movement proper--the revolutionary
movement--has been almost driven underground. The Central office of
the Berlin Executive Council has been repeatedly raided, its leaders
are continually being arrested, and its meetings broken up. At a
conference of the Industrial Councils of Germany recently held (August
26th, 1919) at Halle from which all Majoritarians were excluded, the
general tone was pessimistic. It was recognised that the German
workman was not as a whole revolutionary in sentiment, that the mass
movement to the Left that had marked the first months of reaction had
to some extent been checked and that the Government policy of
compromising with the Council movement had had some measure of
success. No agreement could be reached at this conference, even on
such primary questions of policy as to whether the Government
proposals should be considered or whether the Trades Unions should be
co-operated with. Finally, centres of the revolutionary movement were
established at Halle and Leipzig.
From this it would seem that the revolutionary Council movement is
just at present passing through a phase of depression due to the
Government's diplomatic policy.
It will be seen that so far the German Councils are no political
system, but only a surge of spontaneous self-government. If they can
be really co-ordinated with the new political machinery, and if they
can be concentrated on the economic reconstruction of Germany, it may
be the salvation, not only of Germany but of Europe. For, though the
years of war have accustomed us to looking on Germans as barbarians
and better dead than alive, as a matter of fact this unattractive
people is still, as it always has been, the sturdiest and steadiest of
the workers of the world; and Germany is still the centre of gravity
of the European social system. There can be no stability in Europe if
the Germans are on strike. The consequences of driving the Russians
into extremes are before us now in the worst menace to the existing
social order since the peasants' rising of the Middle Ages. It will
take much pressure to drive the German revolution into extremes, but
if Germany once develops a real Bolshevism of its own, it will not be
long before the rest of the Continent follows its example.
It is a national characteristic of us English to fight new ideas and
institutions in principle abroad, while, in practice, we introduce
them at home under different names. This has worked well on the whole.
While reaction is occupied with damning and downing the novelty as an
absurdity and atrocity introduced by the brutal and barbarous
foreigner, _real-politik_ finds that the same novelty, under some new
name, helps production at home. Thus, while we fight the _Soviets_
with military expeditions and poison gas, and the milder
_Raete-Republics_ of Germany with military missions and diplomatic
notes, we work away at our Guild Socialism and our Shop Stewards'
Committees, extend Whitley Councils to the Civil Service and Welfare
Committees to the Navy, and even admit employes to joint control of
our railways.
There is an English revolution not only impending, but in progress,
and those to whom revolution means barricades and "Bolshevism" will be
relieved to hear that the course of events, both in Germany and
Russia, suggests that our British revolution is so well advanced that
these stimulants of a revolution, that has stiffened and stagnated,
will not be required. England, not being wholly, at all events for
long, run by London clubs and political cliques, manages to achieve
its political revolution by way of economic reconstruction, and it is
doing this on the same principles as Germany, though by a different
procedure. That is why it was as foolish for the British to try to
upset the Council movement of the Berliners as it was for the
Berliners to upset it among the Brunswickers and Bavarians.
Moreover, if the Councils can still be killed, the Germans themselves
will eventually kill them by diddling concessions or by diplomatic
compromises. For such compromises as those already put forward in
Germany show a fatal ignorance of, or indifference to, the fundamental
facts of this revolutionary movement. I much doubt whether the German
revolutionary workmen and their political leaders, whether Independent
or Communist, can ever be got to accept the Labour Chamber
(_Arbeitskammer_) with its parity of representation between employers
and employed; at all events, until the employer is represented by the
State. And such "nationalisation "is only valued by the German workman
as a preliminary to "socialisation." The workers are attached to the
Council idea largely because it attacks the capitalist, and gives the
workmen protection against him in a way the Union cannot. If the
Councils are to be widened into a democracy including all classes, the
power of private capital must first be broken or brought in bounds.
So desperate is the economic condition of the country that even the
Employers' Associations of Berlin have declared in favour of a large
measure of Council government. But this is an exception. The German
ruling class, and their middle-class supporters, recognise that their
class supremacy is challenged. They retort by attacking Council
government as class government and, consequently, as undemocratic. The
issue is represented as being between a Parliamentary democracy, as in
England, and a Soviet despotism, as in Russia. It seems worth while,
therefore, to the German ruling class to fight the revolution with its
own weapon of violence, rather than face the risks of Council
government; and this same view would doubtless be taken in England if
the question of principle were raised. In the recent railway strike
our Government, by appealing for national support against a leading
section of Labour, did, in fact, go far to create a class war.
But, as a matter of fact, the demand for a dictatorship by the
proletariat is not an essential element in the Council movement. Such
a demand is not the cause, but the consequence, of class conflict.
Essentially and fundamentally the Council movement, so far from being
less democratic than our Parliamentary system, is a revolt back to
the purest and most primitive democracy from the artificialities and
anomalies of modern Parliamentary representation. It is no more
undemocratic than the Renaissance was inartistic, the Reformation
unchristian, or the French Revolution anarchical. As the German
Revolution best shows, the growth of Councils is the result of a
revolutionary impulse in a modern community. Such an impulse uses any
form of association between men and women for the urgent political
purpose of appointing a spokesman and leader. The most widely spread
and deeply rooted association nowadays is industrial--in the workshop.
Consequently, we find the Councils taking predominantly an industrial
character and origin, as in our native embryo the Shop Stewards'
Committee. But any association will serve; and so, in the German
Revolution, besides the Workmen's Councils there were Soldiers'
Councils, Communal Councils, and even Unemployed Councils. If this new
system were to develop, so to say, in a vacuum, without opposition, it
would theoretically provide a democratic representation for every
human relationship. As it is, such representation is reduced, as in
Germany, by political pressure, to association that is rooted in the
most vital relationship; and we find the Unemployed Councils,
Communal Councils, and even Soldiers' Councils being choked off, and
only the Workmen's Councils surviving. This is why the practical
process in Germany is, as said before, leading to the same conclusions
as those come to by the _a priori_ reasoning of our own Guild
Socialists when they divide the citizen into consumer and producer,
and, in his latter capacity, give him representation through a Council
system. I found, in fact, that my most useful function in Germany at
one time was putting German Labour leaders in possession of the
conclusions of our Guild Socialists.
Nor, when we come to examine constitutional history, is there any real
difference between the democracy of the Council system and the
democracy of Parliament. They are the same in origin and will probably
be the same in development. For Parliament, it must be remembered,
grew out of a Council with an industrial suffrage--land tenure--which
was later reinforced by a general industrial suffrage through the
Boroughs and their Guild organisations. But, for the first two
centuries of its existence, say 1100 to 1295, Parliament, the National
Council of our Angevin Kings, was a _Soviet_, a _Betriebsrat_. It was
to this body that we owe our Magna Charta of 1215, the foundation of
our democracy. And, in the fourteenth clause of the Great Charter,
the clause constituting Parliament, we read that the summons was to be
sent direct to the Archbishops and Bishops, Earls and Greater Barons,
and, through the Sheriff, to all those "who hold of us in chief." It
was this latter body of tenants of the Crown that became the Knights
of the Shire in our House of Commons. The Knights of the Shire
represented the landed industrial interest as directly as the
representatives of the Boroughs represented other forms of industry
and commerce. Of course, later, the regional and representative system
gradually overlaid and obscured the original industrial basis, much as
it has done with the Council system in Russia and is doing in Germany.
The Council system in Germany has, in three months, indeed, covered
the course that took our Parliamentary system three centuries. This
corresponds roughly to the increased pace of political development
to-day. If we were to translate the Council movement of to-day into
the terms of the Parliamentary movement of seven centuries ago, we
might say that, before our present democracy could begin, industry had
to be nominally socialised by the principle that all land was held of
the King, and a strong central government established on a popular
basis of industrial councils, with equal representation for the two
other estates, the feudal or military and the clerical or official.
For we can see the progenitors of the Soldiers' Councils of to-day in
the feudal courts of yesterday, and of the Civil Service bureaucracy
of to-day in the chancellors and justiciars of yesterday. Thus we may,
if we like, see in the short history of the Russian Council movement
an epitome of our whole constitutional history. Or, we may compare the
present Council movement in England with the political situation early
in the thirteenth century, when the Greater Barons, progenitors of our
Captains of Industry, were about to force clause 14 of Magna Charta
and a National Whitley Council on a Civil Service of arrogant
ascetics, who were vainly trying to retain power for a silly and
selfish ruling class. In applying this analogy to the present day, the
Parliament of to-day would be no more than a survival of a previous
constitutional epoch, a Witanagemot applying Anglo-Saxon Dooms. And
this will, any way, give an idea of the way parliaments are looked
upon to-day by German workmen. Possibly, in the end, the
representative and regional system will rule the roost again, and will
force the industrial suffrage upstairs into a House of Lords that
will, in time, exercise mainly the judicial functions peculiar to its
original industrial character. But we have first to get our Magna
Charta and our Statutes of Westminster.
That the Council system of to-day is a truer democracy than existing
Parliamentary systems is also shown practically by its being a much
surer and safer machine for the realisation of public opinion.
Theoretically, the pyramidal piling up of Councils, each represented
in a superior Council, until a Central Council caps the pile, would
seem to be indirect election raised to infinity; and indirect election
is theoretically undemocratic. But this was not the conclusion forced
on one in Germany when one compared the working of the two systems.
The inferiority in the position of politicians, owing their power to
the Parliamentary system, compared with that of those based on the
Council system, was very striking. The Parliamentarians never knew
where they were or what was what. Out of touch, necessarily, with
their enormous constituencies, they seemed to be always crawling about
with their ears to the ground, dependent on agents and reporters of
every sort, even on the Press, for an idea of what was going on. As
they never knew where the hounds were, they could not use such
knowledge of the country as they had to lead the field. The leaders of
the Council movement, on the other hand, had an immediate indication
of every trend of opinion in the changing composition of the lower
strata of Councils; and their difficulty was rather to control the
energies that came pouring up to them through the system. The
Parliamentary leader seemed like a water finder, wandering about and
waiting for the twig to twiddle, while the Council leader was more
like a marine engineer with his eye on the pressure gauge and his hand
on the lever. Perhaps indirect election is only undemocratic when the
function of the lower body is mainly to elect to a higher, but becomes
democratic when it has vital functions of its own that are merely
controlled by the higher body.
And yet another point and a paradox. Whereas the results of Council
representation of opinion in Germany are not revolutionary, the
results of the Parliamentary system are becoming more and more so, and
not only in Germany but in Great Britain. The failure of the
Parliamentary system to express the forces making for change--a
failure not confined to Germany--and the fictitious relationship
between the elector and the elected has two results. It diverts a
large part of these forces of progress into various forms of direct
action, all of them revolutionary, whether actively so, such as street
fighting, or passively so, such as strikes. It also gives a
revolutionary character to the periodical elections. For the vast
constituencies vote merely along the line of the least common multiple
of their mob minds. This line is generally a vague dissatisfaction;
and unless it be diverted by "stunts" or otherwise diddled, will
result in violent pendulum swings. Under these impulses Parliament
will become still less representative, and will tend to be either
revolutionary or reactionary. For an exaggerated majority is the
extremists' opportunity.
The Council movement, on the other hand, slowly changing from below
upwards, should never drop much behind the drift of opinion, and
consequently should be in little danger of being driven ahead of it.
The German Parliament, as the results of an election decided by this
L.C.M. motive of the mob mind--a motive of assuring power to whichever
party seemed to offer the best prospect of peace abroad and at
home--is to-day reactionary. Whereas the political condition of
Germany to-day is such that it absolutely must have a Government
responsive to the requirements of reconstruction, or relapse into
civil war. The Weimar Parliament is so dead that only civil war can
galvanise it to action. If reinforced by a Council system, the Weimar
Party Government and the Preuss Federal Constitution would perhaps
have steam enough to work.
The Councils are as essential to Germany to-day as the Commons were to
us a century ago. Indeed, our insistence on the supremacy of the
Weimar Assembly as a guarantee for the maintenance of peace, can be
paralleled by our insistence a century ago on the maintenance of Upper
Houses in the constitutions of the States revolutionised from France.
The function of the territorially elected Parliament will, in Germany,
and probably everywhere, become more and more that of an Upper House;
while the industrially elected Congress will be the creative and
constructive institution. The whole difficulty lies in finding a
working compromise, or rather co-operation. Just as Feudalism imposed
its political system which survives in the House of Lords, just as
Liberalism imposed its system as represented in the House of Commons,
which now obviously requires supplementing, so Socialism must have its
political system in the Councils. This is not revolution but
evolution. The revolution comes from thwarting and threatening it.
FOOTNOTES:
[F] They have since been replaced by two anti-revolutionary bodies, a
sort of gendarmerie and a local middle class militia (Einwohnerwehr).
The Frei-corps have become the Reichswehr.
[G] The re-organisation and reconstruction of our political and economic
existence calls for the co-operation of the whole effective population.
The revolution has given us the means of such reconstruction in the
Council system. In order to give the Council system its full development
and a better foundation, fresh elections to the Workmen's Councils are
indispensable.
1. All hand and head workers over 10 years without distinction of sex
who earn their living by labour of public utility without exploiting the
labour of others are entitled to vote. Are also entitled those who
employ a limited number of helpers for their livelihood, as doctors,
druggists, writers, jurists, artists, etc.--as also small industrials
and craftsmen who do not employ others.
2. Are excluded from voting those owners of means of production who use
them to their own advantage and always through the labour of others.
Also those who rent a private-capitalist industry or institutions worked
by the labour of others. Also those who live from ground rents or
interest as also those like Directors, etc., paid in percentage fees.
3. Elections to Workmen's Councils are by proportional representation
and by professions or industries. Great industries form distinct
electoral bodies while medium and small industries will be associated.
Professions and professional groups that do not work with other employes
within a particular industry will form professional electoral bodies;
employes in domestic service, housewives, unemployed and invalids will
be provided for in special regulations.
Further instructions as to the electoral regulations and procedure will
be issued shortly.
The Executive Council,
RICHARD MUeLLER,
FRITZ PROLAT.