comments. Each year at the annual Labor Party conference the newspaper
stages what is usually the liveliest meeting of the week. During the
rest of the year it sponsors "brain trust" meetings throughout the
country at which the Bevanite ideology is expounded and defended.
The tabloid _Tribune_ is a good example of the old "hit him again,
he's still breathing" type of journalism. It does a wonderful job of
dissecting and deflating the stuffed shirts of the right and left. But
it is monotonously strident. The _New Statesman and Nation_, although
not so avowedly Bevanite as _Tribune_, may carry more weight with the
radical left. It is a weekly of great influence.
This influence is exerted principally upon an important group of
intellectual orphans--the young men and women whose education surpassed
their capacities and who now find themselves in dull, poorly paid
jobs, living on a scale of comfort much lower than that of the more
prosperous members of the urban working class. They are dissatisfied
with the system and the government that has condemned them to dreary
days of teaching runny-nosed little boys or to routine civil-service
jobs. Not unnaturally, they welcome political plans and projects which
promise to install them in posts worthy of their abilities as they see
them.
Politically they are on the extreme left. The _New Statesman_
encourages their political beliefs and assures them that their present
lowly estate is due to the system and not to their own failings. The
members of this group are poor. They are occasionally futile and often
ridiculous. But they are not negligible.
That wise man Sir Oliver Franks said once that the political outlook
of this group would have an important effect on Britain's political
situation ten or twenty years hence. My own conclusion is that this
group, like the Bevanites in the constituency labor parties, and the
dissidents in the unions, wants to remake the Labor Party in its own
image and then, when the party has come to power, remake Britain.
The left-wing radicalism of Britain--what we call Bevanism--is thus a
good deal more important than the occasional rebellions of a few MP's
on the Labor side of the House of Commons. It represents in an acute
form the evangelism that is so strong a part of the nonconformist
tradition in Britain. It rebels against the present direction of the
Labor movement and the Parliamentary Labor Party. It wants, not a
Britain governed by the Labor Party, but a socialist Britain.
Can it come to power? Movements of this kind usually win power
during or after some great national convulsion. A war or an economic
depression comparable to that of 1929-36 would give left-wing
radicalism its chance. But either might give right-wing radicalism and
nationalism a chance, too. To win, the Bevanites would have to defeat
the mature power of the great unions and the undoubted abilities of the
present leaders of the party.
The great unions are the result of one hundred and fifty years of
crusading agitation. The labor movement began with them. They have
money and they have power. The "branch" or "lodge" is the basic unit of
organization within the union. Every union member must belong to it.
In an individual plant or factory, the workers of the various unions
are represented by a shop steward, who recruits new members, handles
grievances, and, as the intelligence officer for the workers, keeps in
touch with the management and its plans.
There are regional, district, or area organizations on a higher level
for the larger unions. Finally, there is a national executive council
of elected officials which deals with the national needs of the unions.
At the top is the Trades Union Congress, a confederation of nearly all
the great unions.
The unions have grown so large--the Amalgamated Engineering
Union, for instance, includes thirty-nine separate unions in its
organization--that it is sometimes difficult for the TUC or the
national executive of an individual union to control its members.
But the moderate political outlook--moderate, that is, by Bevanite
standards--still prevails at the top, and the system of card voting,
under which all the votes of a union are cast at the annual conference
according to the decision of its national executive, insures that
the moderate policies of the union leaders will be approved at the
conference.
The imposing voting strength of the unions has been employed at
successive conferences to maintain the policies and leadership of men
like Attlee, Morrison, and Gaitskell. The steamroller in action is an
impressive and, to the Bevanites, an undemocratic sight. But it does
represent millions who advocate a conservative policy for the labor
movement and who, at the moment, are satisfied with evolutionary rather
than revolutionary progress.
The left-wing constituency labor parties create a great deal of noise.
Those which support the moderate leadership are less enterprising in
their propaganda, and, because criticism is often more interesting
than support, they make fewer headlines. But, despite the agonized
pleas of the left wing, hundreds of CLP's are satisfied with the
general ideological policy of the movement and its leaders. This is a
manifestation of the innate conservatism of the British worker. Just
as the Conservatives of twenty years ago distrusted the brilliant
Churchill largely because he was brilliant, so thousands of Labor
voters today distrust the brilliant Bevan.
This group puts its faith in the ebb and flow of the tides of political
opinion in a democracy. It was downcast after the 1955 election, but it
did not despair. "Give the Tories their chance, they'll make a muck of
it," said a union official. "We'll come back at the next election and
pick up where we left off in 1951."
The moderate section of the labor movement enjoys the support of the
only two national newspapers that are unreservedly Labor: the tabloid
_Daily Mirror_ and the _Daily Herald_. The _Mirror_, with an enormous
circulation of 4,725,000, consistently supported Hugh Gaitskell for
leadership of the party. So did the _Herald_, but it is a quieter
paper than the brash tabloid, and its influence in trade-union circles,
once great, seems to be declining, although the TUC remains a large
shareholder.
The election of Gaitskell as leader of the Parliamentary Labor Party on
Attlee's retirement was a severe blow to the Bevanites. But the tactics
employed by Gaitskell in his first months as Leader of the Opposition
were probably even more damaging to Bevan's hopes.
Bevan came out of his parliamentary corner swinging at the new leader.
In the past this had provoked Herbert Morrison, then deputy leader,
and even Attlee to retaliatory measures. Gaitskell paid no attention
to Bevan, but went about his work of presiding over the reorganization
of the party machine and of leading the party in the House of Commons.
Bevan huffed and puffed about the country making speeches on Saturdays
and Sundays. But as his targets said little in reply, the speeches
became surprisingly repetitious. Moreover, with the establishment of
the new Labor front bench in the Commons, Bevan took one of the seats
and became the party's chief spokesman, first on colonial affairs and
then on foreign affairs. It is difficult to make criticisms of the
party leader stick at Saturday meetings if, from Monday through Friday,
the critic sits cheek by jowl in the House of Commons with the target
in an atmosphere of polite amiability.
Bevan's bearing in the debate over the Suez policy increased his
stature in the party and in the country. Indeed, his approach to the
crisis impressed even his enemies as more statesmanlike and more
"national" than that of Gaitskell. Gaitskell, of course, labors under
the difficulty of being a member of the middle class from which so
many Conservative politicians spring. They naturally regard him as a
traitor, and criticisms by Gaitskell of Conservative foreign policy are
much more bitterly denounced than those of Bevan. To the Tories, Bevan
was speaking for the country, Gaitskell for the party.
The schism in the party is not healed. Too much has been said, the
convictions are too firmly held for that. But Gaitskell has been
successful in creating a façade of co-operation which thus far has
been proof against Bevan's outbursts on the platform or in _Tribune_.
However, the reaction of the two leaders to the Eisenhower doctrine
for the Middle East demonstrated the width of their differences on
a fundamental problem. The future of this struggle has a direct and
decisive bearing on the future of the labor movement. If Labor is to
return to power in an election that is unaffected by a national crisis,
foreign or domestic, the schism must be healed.
As a major political party, the labor movement has been molded by many
influences. Before the First World War, German Social Democracy and the
Fabians affected it. The party then acquired the tenets of national
ownership and ultimate egalitarianism in the most class-conscious of
nations which give it its socialist tone. But a party so large covers a
wide range of political belief. It is a socialist party to some. It is
a labor party to others. Above all, it is a means, like the Republican
and Democratic parties, of advancing the interests of a large number
of practical politicians whose interests in socialism are modified by
their interest in what will win votes.
The moderate center of the Labor Party now dominates the movement just
as the moderate center of the Conservative Party dominates the Tory
organization. In each the leader represents the mood of the majority
within the parliamentary party. Macmillan is a little to the left of
center among Conservatives. Gaitskell is a little to the right of
center in the Labor Party. The identity of interest among the two
dominant groups is greater than might appear from the robust exchanges
in the House of Commons.
The radical wings in both parties are handicapped at this point by
a seeming inability to understand that politics is the art of the
possible. Herbert Morrison, a great practical politician, summed up
this weakness of the radical left at a Labor conference. A resolution
demanding the immediate nationalization of remaining industry--at a
time when the country was prosperous and fully employed--was before the
conference. Do you think, he asked, that anyone will _vote_ for such a
program?
[Illustration]
VI. _A Quiet Revolution by a Quiet People_
_Revolutions begin with infatuation and end with incredulity. In their
origin proud assurance is dominant; the ruling opinion disdains doubt
and will not endure contradiction. At their completion skepticism
takes the place of disdain and there is no longer any care for
individual convictions or any belief in truth._
F.P.G. GUIZOT
_Revolutions are not made; they come. A revolution is as natural a
growth as an oak. It comes out of the past. Its foundations are laid
far back._
WENDELL PHILLIPS
[Illustration]
The changes in Britain since 1939 have been revolutionary. Yet because
Britain is a nation with a highly developed political sense, the
revolution has been fought not at barricades but in ballot boxes. And,
seen on the broadest scale, what has happened to Britain and its people
at home is part of what has been happening all over the world since
1939. The year that saw the start of World War II saw the beginning of
a terrible acceleration of forces that for fifty years had been slowly,
sometimes almost imperceptibly weakening Britain's position.
This book is concerned principally with Britain. But let us look
at what has happened to British interests abroad since 1939. The
Indian Empire is gone. The lifeline of what remains of the Empire is
unraveling in Ceylon, Singapore, Aden, and Cyprus. The rise of the
Soviet Union and the United States has dwarfed Britain as a world
power, and the imaginative conception of the Commonwealth is not yet,
and may never be, an adequate balance to these two vast conglomerations
of industrial and military power. Britain's ties with some of the
Commonwealth nations--notably South Africa--grow weaker year by year.
The remaining colonies are moving toward self-government, as the
British always planned, but it is doubtful whether after they leave
the Empire nest they will be any more loyal or responsive to British
leadership than Ceylon is today.
We are living through one of the most important processes of recent
history, the liquidation of an empire that has lasted in various
forms for about two hundred and fifty years. It is a tribute to the
people who gave it life, to their courage, political flexibility, and
foresight, that, despite the changes and the retreats, they are still
reckoned a power in world affairs.
History has its lessons. In 1785 Britain had lost her most important
overseas possessions, the American colonies, and the courts of Europe
rejoiced at the discomfiture of the island people and their armies
and navies. A third of a century later the British had organized the
coalition that ultimately defeated Napoleon, the supreme military
genius of his time, and were carving out a new empire in India,
Australia, and Africa.
We need not drop back so far in history. When, shortly before the
Second World War, I went to England, it was fashionable and very
profitable to write about the decay of Britain. Some very good books
were written on the subject, and they were being seriously discussed
when this island people, alone, in a tremendous renaissance of
national energy, won the Battle of Britain and saved the Western world
from the danger of German domination. As generations of Spaniards,
French, and Germans have learned, it is unwise to count the British out.
Yet an observer from Mars limiting his observations to the home islands
would find reason to do so today. For the Britain of today resembles
very little the Britain that, despite the long and, by the standards
of that day, costly war in South Africa, greeted the twentieth century
proudly confident.
Britain's old position as "the workshop of the world" has vanished.
There are now two other Britains--two nations, that is, which depend
largely on the production and export of manufactured goods to live.
Both these nations, Germany and Japan, are the defeated enemies of
World War II, and both of them were bidding for and getting a share of
Britain's overseas trade before that war and, indeed, before World War
I. The decline in Britain's economic strength did not begin in 1939.
The second world conflict, beginning only twenty-one years after
the close of the first, accelerated the decline. Into World War II
Britain poured both blood and treasure, just as she had in the earlier
conflict. But 1914-18 had left her less of both. British casualties in
World War II were smaller than in the first conflict, but the damage
done to Britain's position in the world was much greater.
The differences between the Britain of 1939 and the Britain of 1945
affected much more than the international position of the country. A
society had been grabbed, shaken, and nearly throttled by the giant
hand of war. After that bright Sunday morning in September when the
sirens sounded for the first time in earnest, things were never the
same again.
I remember an evening in April 1939. It was sunny and warm, and the
men and women came out of their offices and relaxed in the sunlight.
The Germans were on the move in Europe, but along the Mall there
was nothing more disturbing than the honk of taxi horns. London lay
prosperous and sleek, assured and confident.
Six years later I came back from Germany. I had been in London much of
the time during the war, but now I had been away for over a year, and
I found the contrast between that September evening and the far-off
evening in April impressive. It was not the bomb damage; there was
more of that in Germany. But London and Londoners had broken their
connection with the confident past. It was a shabbier, slower world,
face to face with new realities.
The impact of the war on the average Briton was greater than on the
average American because for long periods the Briton lived with it on
terms of frighteningly personal intimacy. Americans went to war. The
war came to the British. In the process an ordered society was shaken
to its foundations, personal and national savings were swept away, the
physical industrial system of the country was subjected to prolonged
attack and then to a fierce national drive for increased industrial
production. For close to six years the country was a fortress and then
a staging area for military operations. By the end of the war and the
dawn of an austere peace the nation was prepared psychologically for
the other changes introduced by a radical change in political direction.
Mobilization of military and economic forces during the war was more
complete in Britain than in any other combatant save possibly the
Soviet Union. The result of immediate peril and the prospect of defeat,
it began early in 1940. This mobilization was the start of the social
changes that have been going on in Britain ever since.
The mingling of classes began. Diana, the rector's daughter, and Nigel,
the squire's son, found themselves serving in the ranks with Harriet
from Notting Hill and Joe from Islington. In the end, of course, Diana
was commissioned in the Wrens and Nigel was a captain in a county
regiment, largely but not entirely because of their superior education;
however, their contacts with Harriet and Joe gave them a glimpse of a
Britain they had not known about before.
Things changed at home, too. The rectory was loud with the voices of
children evacuated from the slums of London or Coventry, and the
squire spent his days farming as he never had before and his nights
with the Home Guard. All over the country, men and women were giving up
those jobs which were unnecessary in war and venturing into new fields.
The assistant in the Mayfair dress shop found herself in a factory, the
greens-keeper was in a shipyard.
The old, safe, quiet life of Britain ended. There were no more quiet
evenings in the garden, no more leisurely teas in the working-class
kitchen, no more visits to Wimbledon. People worked ten or twelve hours
a day, and when they ate they ate strange dishes made of potatoes and
carrots, and when they drank they drank weak beer and raw gin. These
conditions were not universal. There were the shirkers in the safe
hotels and the black markets. And, despite the bands playing "There'll
Always Be an England" (a proposition that seemed highly doubtful in
the summer of 1940) and despite the rolling oratory and defiance of
Mr. Churchill, there was plenty of grousing. It was, they said in the
ranks, "a hell of a way to run the bleedin' war"; or, as the suburban
housewife remarked in the queue, "I really think they could get us
some decent beef. How the children are to get along on this I cannot
imagine."
They went on, though. They were bombed and strafed and shelled, they
were hungry and tired. The casualty lists came in from Norway, France,
the Middle East, Burma, Malaya. The machines in the factories were as
strained as the workers. Then, finally, it was over and they had won.
Only a minute number had ever thought they would be beaten. But they
were not the same people who had gone dutifully to war in 1939. Nor was
the world the same.
"Well, it's time to go home and pick up the pieces," said a major in
Saxony in the summer of 1945. He, and thousands like him, found that
the pieces just were not there any more. The economic drain of the war
had made certain that Britons, far from enjoying the fruits of victory,
would undergo further years of unrelenting toil in a scarred and shabby
country.
People were restless. They had been unsettled not only by the impact
of the war but by the glimpse of other societies. Not until the last
two and a half years of the war, when the American Army and Air Force
began to flood into Britain, did people become aware of the size,
power, and mechanical ingenuity and efficiency of the people who were
so inaccurately portrayed by Hollywood. Some saw in Russia's resistance
to the Germans and her final sweeping victories proof that the
Communist society could endure and triumph no less than those of the
Western democracies. Many who understood what had happened to British
power during the war were convinced that if the country was to retain
its position in the world, it would have to seek new, adventurous
methods in commerce and industry and new men and new policies in
politics. This conviction was held by hundreds of thousands who had
once voted Liberal or Conservative but who in the election of 1945 were
to cast their votes for the Labor Party.
The political history of the immediate pre-war period offers a reason
for this change. The defeats of 1940 and 1941 were a tremendous shock
to Britons. During the war there was no time for lengthy official
post-mortems on the alarming inadequacy of British arms in France in
1940 or in the first reverses in the western desert of Libya a year
later. But the polemics of the left managed to convince a great many
people that the blame lay with the pre-war Conservative governments of
Neville Chamberlain and Stanley Baldwin. When in 1945 the chance came
to revenge themselves on the Tories, even though Winston Churchill,
who had opposed both Chamberlain and Baldwin, was the Conservatives'
leader, millions took the chance and voted Labor into office.
The urge for change to meet changing conditions at home and new forces
abroad was not universal. The people of the middle class had not
yet fully understood what the war had done to Britain's economy and
especially to that section of it which supported them. There was very
strong opposition to the first post-war American loan in sections of
this class, largely from people whose confidence had not been shaken
by the cataclysm. The austerity imposed by Sir Stafford Cripps, the
Socialist Chancellor of the Exchequer, was neither understood nor
welcomed. The withdrawal from India was hotly opposed--and, it should
be remembered, not purely on imperialist grounds. For two hundred years
the middle class had provided the officers and civil servants who led
and administered the Indian Army and the government of British India.
As a class it knew a great deal more about India and the Indians than
the union leaders and earnest young intellectuals of Mr. Attlee's
government knew. The Socialist speakers and newspapers scoffed at "the
toffy-nosed old ex-colonels" who predicted bloody and prolonged rioting
between the Hindus and the Moslems once British power was withdrawn.
The rioting began, and before it was over the bloodshed was greater
than in all the British punitive actions from the Mutiny onward.
None of this generally Conservative opposition could halt or even check
a Labor government that had been voted into power in 1945 with 393
seats in the House of Commons as opposed to 216 for the Conservatives
and 12 for the Liberals. The Tories were out, the new day had dawned,
and the Labor Party, in full control of the government for the first
time in its history, set out to remake Britain.
No one in Britain could plead ignorance of what the Labor Party
was about to do. Since 1918 it had been committed to extensive
nationalization of industry and redistribution of income. Moreover, it
came to power at a moment when the old patterns of industrial power and
political alignments had been ruptured by war and when voters other
than those who habitually voted Labor were acknowledging the need for
change.
The 1945 policy statement of the Labor Party was called "Let Us Face
the Future." It dotted all the _i_'s and crossed all the _t_'s in
Labor's program.
The statement began with a good word for freedom, always highly
esteemed by political parties seeking power. But it added an
interesting comment. "There are certain so-called freedoms that Labor
will not tolerate; freedom to exploit other people; freedom to pay poor
wages and to push up prices for selfish profits; freedom to deprive
the people of the means of living full, happy, healthy lives."