The industrial policy idea has received its most remarkable indorsement

in the great British railway strike of 1911. Before showing what lay

behind this epoch-making movement, let me refer to the great change in

the British Union world that preceded it.

In 1910 there occurred an unprecedented series of strikes in the four

larges industries of the country, the railroads, shipbuilding, cotton,

and coal-mining--all within a few months of one another, _and all

against the advice of the officials of the unions_. The full and exact

significance of this movement was seen when the hitherto conservative

Trade Union Congress, after a very vigorous debate, decided, on the

motion of Ben Tillett, to take a referendum of the unions on the

question of the "practicability of a confederation of all trades" and on

the "_possibility of terminating all trade agreements on a given date

after each year_."

In the same year a great agitation began, led by the most prominent

advocate of industrial unionism in Great Britain, the Socialist, Tom

Mann, who with John Burns had been one of the organizers of the great

dockers' strike in 1886, and who had returned, in 1910, from many years

of successful agitation in Australia to preach the new unionism in his

home country. That this agitation was one of the causes of the great

seamen's, dockers', and railway strikes that followed is indicated by

the fact that Mr. Mann was at once given the chief position in this

movement.

His first principle is that the unions should include _all_ the workers,

in their respective industries:--

"Skilled workers, in many instances doing but little work, receive

from two to seven or eight pounds a week, whilst the laborer,

having the same responsibilities as regards family and citizenship,

is compelled to accept one third of it or less.

"This must not be. We must not preach social equality and utterly

fail to practice it; and for those receiving the higher pay to try

and satisfy the demands of the lower-paid man for better conditions

by telling him it will be put right under Socialism, is on a par

with the parson pretending to assuage the sufferings of the

poverty-stricken by saying, 'It will be better in the next world.'

It must be put right in _this_ world, and we must see to it _now_."

Unions composed exclusively of skilled workers, as many of the present

ones, operate against the interests of the less skilled--often without

actually intending to do so. Mr. Mitchell, for instance, concedes that

the trade unions bring about "the elimination of men who are below a

certain fixed standard of efficiency." This argument will appeal

strongly to employers and believers in the survival of the fittest

doctrine. But it will scarcely appeal to the numerous unskilled workers

eliminated, or the still more numerous workers whose employment is thus

lessened at every slack season. Mr. Edmond Kelly shows how the principle

acts--"Where there is a minimum wage of $4 a day the workman can no

longer choose to do only $3 worth of work and be paid accordingly, but

he must earn $4 or else cease from work, at least in that particular

trade, locality, or establishment."[254] The result is that the highest

skilled workmen obtain steady employment through the union, while the

less skilled are penalized by underemployment. The unions have equalized

daily wages, but the employer has replied by making employment and

therefore annual wages all the more unequal, and many of the workers may

have lost more than they gained. Whereas if each man could secure an

equal share of work, he might be paid according to his efficiency and

yet be far better off than now. But the only way to secure an equal

amount of work for all is through a union where all have an equal voice

and where the union is strong enough to have a say as to who is to be

employed.

It is this tendency either automatically or intentionally actually to

injure unskilled labor, that has led men like Mann and Debs and Haywood

to their severe criticism of the present policies of the unions, and

even affords some ground for Tolstoi's classification of well-paid

artisans, electricians, and mechanics among the exploiters of unskilled

labor. In the days of serfdom, the great writer said, "Only one class

were slave owners; all classes, except the most numerous one--consisting

of peasants who have too little land, laborers, and workingmen--are

slave-owners now." The master class, Tolstoi says, to-day includes, not

only "nobles, merchants, officials, manufacturers, professors, teachers,

authors, musicians, painters, rich peasants, and the rich men's

servants," but also "well-paid artisans, electricians, mechanics," etc.

Mr. Mann thus defines the attitude of this new unionism to the old:--

"It is well known that in Britain, as elsewhere, there is only a

minority of the workers organized; of the ten millions of men

eligible for industrial organization only one fourth are members of

trade unions; naturally these are, in the main, the skilled

workers, who have associated together with a view to maintaining

for themselves the advantage accruing to skilled workers, when

definite restrictions are placed upon the numbers able to enter and

remain in the trades.

"We have had experience enough to know that the difficulties of

maintaining a ring fence around an occupation, which secures to

those inside the fence special advantages, are rapidly increasing,

and in a growing number of instances, the fence has been entirely

broken down by changes in the methods of production. We know,

further, that ... the majority of trade unionists still remain

_sectionally isolated_, powerless to act except in single'

sectional bodies, and incapable of approaching each other and

merging and amalgamating forces for common action. _This it is that

is responsible for the modern practice of entering into lengthy

agreements between employers and workers. Sectional trade unions

being incapable of offensive action, and gradually giving way

before the persistent power of the better organized capitalist

class, they fall back upon agreements for periods of from two to

five years, during which time they undertake that no demands shall

be made._" (My italics.)

The industrialists, therefore, advocate the termination of all wage

agreements simultaneously and at short intervals or even at will (like

tenancies at will, or call loans). They claim that employers are

practically free to terminate _existing agreements_ whenever they

please, as they can always find grounds for dismissing individuals or

for temporarily shutting down their works or for otherwise

discriminating against active unionists or varying the terms of a

contract before its expiration. But it is in America that the policy of

no agreements, or agreements at will is most advanced. In Great Britain

it is thought that agreements for one year and all ending on the same

day may lead to the same results. If there is a central organization

with power to call strikes on the part of any combination of unions, and

the large majority of the workers are organized, it is held that the new

unionism will soon prove irresistible, even if agreements in this form

are retained.

The recent strikes have not only been stimulated by this gospel and led

by its chief representatives, Tom Mann, Ben Tillett, and others, but

from the very first they have been an actual application of the new idea

and have marked a long step towards the complete reorganization of the

British unions. They were started with the seamen's strike in June, when

the dockers in many places struck in sympathy, at the same time adding

demands of their own. When the seamen won their strike, they refused to

go back to work at several points, against the advice of their

conservative officials, until the dockers received what they were

striking for. With the dockers were involved teamsters, and these from

the first had agreed to support one another, for _they were both

connected with Mr. Mann's "National Transport Workers' Federation_." And

the railway strike was largely due to the fact that the railway unions

decided at least _to coöperate_ with this federation. The dockers had

remained on strike at Liverpool in sympathy with the railway porters who

had struck in the first instance to aid the dockers, and at the first

strike conference of the railway union officials, forty-one being

present, it was voted unanimously "that the union was determined not to

settle the dispute with the companies unless the lockout imposed upon

their co-workers because of their support of the railroad men at

Liverpool and elsewhere is removed and all the men reinstated."

There can be little doubt that the railway strike would neither have

taken place at the critical time it did, nor have gone as far as it

went, except for this new and concerted action which embraced even the

least skilled and least organized classes of labor.

Accompanying this movement toward common action, "solidarity" of labor,

and more and more general strikes, was the closely related reaction

against existing agreements--on the ground that they cripple the unions'

power of effective industrial warfare. For several years there had been

a simultaneous movement on the part of the "State Socialist" government

towards compulsory arbitration, and among the unions against any

interference on the part of a government over which they have little or

no control--the railway strike being directed, according to the

unionists, as much against the government as against the railways. For

many years the government, represented by Mr. Lloyd George or Mr.

Winston Churchill, had acted as arbitrator in every great industrial

conflict, and had secured many minor concessions for the unions. As long

as no critical conflict occurred that might materially weaken either the

government or the capitalist or employing classes as a whole, this

policy worked well. It was only by a railway strike, or perhaps by a

seamen's or miners' strike that it could be put to a real test. By the

settlement of the threatened railway strike of 1907 the employees had

gained very little, and had _voluntarily_ left the final power to decide

disputes in the hands of government arbitrators. A conservative

Labourite, Mr. J. R. MacDonald, writing late in 1910, said:--

"We held at the time that the agreement which Mr. Bell accepted on

behalf of the Railway Servants would not work. It was a surrender.

The railway directors were consulted for days; they were allowed to

alter the terms of agreement at their own sweet will, and when they

agreed, the men's representatives were asked to go to the Board of

Trade and were told that they could not alter a comma, could not

sleep over the proposal, could not confer with any one about it,

had to accept it there and then. In a moment of weakness they

accepted. An agreement come to in such a way was not likely to be

of any use to the men."[255]

Nevertheless, this extremely important settlement was accepted by the

union. Mr. Churchill did not know how to restrain his enthusiasm for

unions that were so good as to fall in so obediently with his political

plans. "They are not mere visionaries or dreamers," says Churchill,

"weaving airy Utopias out of tobacco smoke. They are not political

adventurers who are eager to remodel the world by rule of thumb, who are

proposing to make the infinite complexities of scientific civilization

and the multitudinous phenomena of great cities conform to a few

barbarous formulas which any moderately intelligent parrot could repeat

in a fortnight. The fortunes of trade unions are interwoven with the

industries they serve. The more highly organized trade unions are, the

more clearly they recognize their responsibilities."[256]

By 1911 the whole situation was completely reversed. Over less important

bodies of capitalists and employers than the railways, the government

had power and a will to exercise its power. The railways, however, are

practically a function of government--absolutely indispensable if it is

to retain its other powers _undiminished_. It was for this reason that

little if any governmental force was used against them, and the

agreement of 1907 came to be of even less value to the men than

agreements made in other industries. When the chorus of union complaints

continued to swell, and the men asked the government to bring pressure

on the railways, at least to meet their committee, it acknowledged

itself either unable or unwilling to take any effective action unless to

renew the offer to appoint another royal commission, essentially of the

same character as that of 1907 except that it should be smaller and

should act more speedily. This still meant that the third member of the

board was to be appointed by a government, in which experience had

taught the workers they could have no confidence--_at least in its

dealings with the powerful railways_.

In view of this inherent weakness of the government, or its hostility to

the new and aggressive unionism, or perhaps a combination of both, the

unions had no recourse other than a direct agreement or a strike. But

the refusal of the railways to meet the men left no alternative other

than the strike, and at the same time showed that they did not much fear

that the unions could strike with success. It was no longer a question

of the justice or injustice, truth or untruth, of the unions' claims.

The railways, in a perfectly practical and businesslike spirit,

questioned the power of the unions, by means of a strike, to cause them

sufficient damage to make it profitable even to meet their

representatives--without the presence of a government representative,

who, they had learned by experience, would in all probability take a

position with which they would be satisfied. Mr. Asquith's offer, then,

to submit the "correctness" of the unions' statements and the

"soundness" of their contentions to a tribunal, was entirely beside the

point. The representatives of the railways were sure to give such a

tribunal to understand, however diplomatically and insidiously, that the

unions were without that power, which alone, in the minds of "practical"

men, can justify any considerable demand, such as the settlement of all

questions through the representatives of the men (the recognition of the

union).

Doubtless the railways had refused to meet the union representatives

until they felt assured that the government's position would on the

whole be satisfactory to them. The government's real attitude was made

plain when, after the refusal of the unions practically to leave their

whole livelihood and future in its hands, as in 1907, it used this as a

pretext for taking sides against them--not by prohibiting the strike,

but by limiting more and more narrowly the scope it was to be allowed to

take.

The government loudly protested its impartiality, and gave very powerful

and plausible arguments for interference. But the laborers feel that the

right not to work is as essential as life itself, and all that

distinguishes them essentially from slaves, and that no argument

whatever is valid against it. Let us look at a few of the government

statements:--

The government, said the Premier, was perfectly impartial in regard to

the merits of the various points of dispute. The government had regard

exclusively for _the interests of the public_, and having regard for

those interests they could not allow the paralysis of the railway

systems throughout the country, and would have to take the necessary

steps to prevent such paralysis.

The representatives of the unions replied by a public statement, in

which they declared that this was an "unwarrantable threat" and an

attempt to put the responsibility for the suspension of work on the

unions:--

"We consider the statement made in behalf of his Majesty's

government, _an unwarrantable threat_ uttered against the railroad

workers who for years have made repeated applications to the Board

of Trade and also to Parliament to consider the advisability of

amending the conciliation board scheme of 1907.... And further it

shows a failure of the Board of Trade to amend its own scheme, and

also of the railroad companies to give an impartial and fair

interpretation of such schemes.... And inasmuch as this joint

meeting has already urged the employers to meet us with a view to

discussing the whole position and which, if agreed to by them,

would in our opinion have settled the matter, _we therefore refuse

to accept the responsibility the government has attempted to throw

upon us_, and further respectfully but firmly ask his Majesty's

government whether the responsibility of the railroad companies is

in any degree less than that of other employers of labor."

In other words, there is and can be no law compelling men to labor, and

no matter what the consequences of their refusal to work, it is a matter

that concerns the workers themselves more than all other persons.

Mr. Winston Churchill made a more detailed statement. He said that "the

government was taking all necessary steps to make sure that the _food

supply as well as fuel and other essentials_ should not be interrupted

on the railways or at the ports."

"All services vital to the community should be maintained, and the

government would see to that, not because they were on the side

either of the employers or the workmen, but because they were bound

to protect the public from the danger that a general arrest of

industry would entail." He continued:--

"The means whereby the people of this land live are highly

artificial, and a serious breakdown would lead to starvation among

a great number of poorer people. Not the well-to-do would suffer,

but the poor of the great cities and those dependent upon them, who

would be quite helpless if the machinery by which they are fed--_on

which they are dependent for wages_--was thrown out of gear.

"The government believes that the arrangements made for working the

lines of communication, and for the maintenance of order, will

prove effective; but, if not, other measures of even larger scope

will be taken promptly. It must be clearly understood that there is

no escape from these facts, and, as they affect the supply of food

for the people, and _the safety of the country, they are far more

important than anything else_."

To this the railway workers answered that it is to protect their own

food that they strike, and that food is as important to them as to

others, that practically all those who are dependent on wages are

willing to undergo the last degree of suffering to preserve the right

to strike, that the means of livelihood of this majority are no whit

less important than the "safety" of the rest of the country. Moreover,

if the government is allowed to use military or other means to aid the

railways to transport food, fuel, and other things, more or less

essential, it prevents that very "paralysis" which is the necessary

object of every strike. Industrial warfare of this critical kind must

indeed be costly to the whole community, often endangering health and

even life itself, but the workers are almost unanimous in believing that

a few days or weeks of this, repeated only after years of interval,

costs far less in life and health than the low wages paid to labor year

after year and generation after generation. _They demand the right to

strike unhampered by any government in which capitalistic or other than

wage-earning classes predominate._ Only when the government falls into

the hands of a group of wholly non-capitalist classes--of which wage

earners form the majority--will they expect it to grant such rights and

conditions as are sufficient to compensate them for parting with any

element of the right to strike.

The great British strike, then, had a double significance. It showed the

tremendously increased strength of labor when every class of workers is

organized and all are united together, and it showed an increasing

unwillingness to allow separate agreements to stand in the way of

general strikes.

The strength of the strikers in the British upheaval of 1911,

however, has been grossly exaggerated on both sides. There is no

doubt that the aggressive action came from the masses of the

workers, as their leaders held them back in nearly every instance.

There is no question that the various unions coöperated more than

usual, that vast masses of the unskilled were for the first time

organized, and that these features won the strikes. The advance was

remarkable--but we can only measure the level reached if we realize

the point from which the start was made. As a matter of fact, the

unskilled labor of Great Britain until 1911 was probably worse paid

and less organized than that of any great manufacturing

country--and the advance made by no means brings it to the level of

the United States.

Since the great dock strike of 1886, led by John Burns and Tom

Mann, unskilled labor has tried in vain to organize effectively

unions like those of the seamen and railway servants, the majority

of whose members were neither of the least skilled nor of the most

skilled classes, had an uphill fight, and were only able to

organize a part of the workers. Five dollars a week was considered

such a high and satisfactory wage by the wholly unskilled (dockers,

etc.) that it was often made the basis of their demands. The Board

of Trade Report shows that 400,000 railwaymen, including the most

skilled, had from 1899 to 1909 an average weekly wage varying from

$6.35 to $6.60 per week. The railway union found that of a quarter

of a million men 39 per cent got less than $5 a week, and 89 per

cent less than $7.50. Seamen at Liverpool received from $20 to

$32.50 a month.

If then the Liverpool sailors received an increase of $2.50 a

month, while the wages of other strikers were raised on the average

about 20 per cent, what must we conclude? Undoubtedly the gain was

worth all the labor and sacrifice it cost. But it must be

remembered, first, that these wages are still markedly inferior to

those of this country in spite of its hordes of foreign labor; and

second, that the increase is little if any above the rise in the

cost of living in recent years, and will undoubtedly soon be

overtaken by a further rise. The great steamship lines increased

their rates on account of the strike almost the same week that it

was concluded, and the railway companies gave in only when the

government consented that they should raise their rates. But the

larger part of the consumers are workingmen, and their cost of

living is thus rising more rapidly than ever _on account of the

strikes_. Finally, the unions of the unskilled are as a rule not

yet recognized by their employers, while the railway union is

probably as completely at the mercy of the government as ever.

In a word, _the point reached_ is by no means very advanced; on the

other hand, _the material gain made_ in view of the former

backwardness of the railwaymen, seamen, and dockers is highly

important for England, while the methods employed, the movement

having originated from below, and having been sustained against

conservative leaders (only a few radicals like Tom Mann and Ben

Tillett being trusted), is of world-wide significance. The unions

as well as their common organizations, the Trade Union Congress,

the Labour Party, and the General Federation of Trade Unions are

drawing closer together, while the Socialists and revolutionary

unionists are everywhere taking the lead--as evidenced, for

example, by the election of the most radical Socialist member of

Parliament, Mr. Will Thorne, to be President of the 1912 Trade

Union Congress.

The success of the new movement as against the older Labour Party

and trade union tactics may also be seen from the disturbed state

of mind of the older leaders. Take, for example, the attack of the

Chairman of the Labour Party, Mr. J. R. MacDonald:--

"The new revolution which Syndicalism and its advocates of the

Industrial Workers of the World contemplate has avoided none of the

errors or the pitfalls of the old, but it has added to them a whole

series of its own. It has never considered the problems which it

has to meet. It is, as expressed in the _Outlook_ of this month, a

mere escapade of the nursery mind. It is the product of the

creative intelligence of the man who is impatient because it takes

the earth twenty-four hours to wheel around the sun (sic).... The

hospitality which the Socialist movement has offered so generously

to all kinds of cranks and scoundrels because they professed to be

in revolt against the existing order has already done our movement

much harm. Let it not add Syndicalism to the already too numerous

vipers which, in the kindness of its heart, it is warming on its

hearthstones."[257] [258]

The new revolutionary unionism takes different forms in Great Britain,

France, and America. In France it has expressed itself through agitation

for the general strike and against the army, the only thing that a

general strike movement has to fear. The agitation has completely

captured the national federation of unions, has a well-developed

literature, a daily paper (_La Bataille Syndicaliste_--The Union

Battle,--established in 1911), and has put its principles into effect in

many ways, especially by more numerous and widespread strikes and by

attacks on military discipline. But there has been no strike so nearly

general as the recent British one, and both the efforts in this

direction and those directed against the army have a future rather than

a present importance and will be considered in succeeding chapters (Part

III, Chapters VI and VII).

In America the new movement first appeared several years ago in the very

radical proposal indorsed at the time by Debs, Haywood, and many

prominent Socialists, to replace the older unions by a new set built on

entirely different principles, including organizations of the least

skilled, and the solid union of all unions for fighting purposes. This

movement took concrete form in a new organization, the Industrial

Workers of the World, which was launched with some promise, but soon

divided into factions and was abandoned by Debs and others of its

organizers. It has grown in strength in some localities, having

conducted the remarkable struggles at McKees Rocks (Pa.) and Lawrence

(Mass.), but is not at present a national factor--which is in part due,

perhaps, to the fact that the older unions are tending, though

gradually, towards somewhat similar principles.

Not only is Socialism spreading rapidly in all the unions, but along

with it is spreading this new unionism. For many years the Western

Federation of Miners, famous as the central figure in all the labor wars

in the Rocky Mountain States, was the most powerful union in this

country that was representative both of revolutionary Socialism and of

revolutionary unionism. But it was not a part of the American

Federation of Labor. When it became closely united with the Coal Miners,

and the latter union forced its admission into the American Federation

of Labor (in 1911), it at once began a campaign for its principles

inside this organization. It now stands for two proposals, the first of

which would solidly unite all the unions, and the second of which would

cut all bonds between labor and capital. Neither is likely to be adopted

this year, but both seem sure of a growing popularity and will in all

probability result in some radical and effective action within a very

few years.

In its Convention of July, 1911, the Western Federation of Miners

decided to demand of the Federation of Labor the free exchange of

membership cards among all its constituent unions. Thus the unions would

preserve their autonomy, but every member would be free, when he changed

his employer, to pass from one to the other without cost. The result

would be that quarrels between the unions over members would lessen

automatically, and also admission fees, dues, and benefits would tend

towards a level. Thus all the things that keep the unions apart and

prevent common action against the employer would be gradually removed,

and the tendency of certain unions to ignore the interests of others

reduced to a minimum. The plan is practical, because it has already been

in successful operation for many years in France.

Another new policy--which should be regarded as a supplementary means

for bringing about the same result--would be to so strengthen and

democratize the general Federation as to allow great power to be placed

in the hands of the executive, and at the same time subject it to the

direct control of the combined rank and file of all the unions. If, for

example, national Federation officials were elected, instructed, and

recalled by a vote of all the unionists in the country, the latter would

probably be willing to place in the hands of such an executive power to

call out the unions in strike in such combinations as would make the

resistance of employers most difficult, and power to control national

strike funds collected from all the unions for these contests. Unions

with a specially strong strategic situation in industry and a favored

situation in the Federation are not yet ready to forego their privileges

for this form of direct democracy, but the tendency is in this

direction. (Since these lines were first written the Federation has

taken steps towards the adoption of this plan of direct election of its

officials by national referendum.)

Indeed, when the Western Miners' second proposal, the refusal to sign

agreements for any fixed period, is adopted, this simultaneous

centralization and democratization of the Federation may proceed apace.

As long as the various unions are bound to the employers by an entirely

separate and independent agreement terminable at different dates, it is

impossible to arrange strikes in common, especially when the more

fortunate unions adopt an entirely different plan of organization and an

entirely different policy from the rest. The Western Miners now propose

that all agreements be done away with, a practice they had followed long

and successfully themselves--with the single tacit exception of the

employees of the Smelter Trust (Guggenheim's). This exception they have

now done away with. Their fundamental idea is that as long as the

capitalist reserves his right to close down his works whenever he

believes his interests or those of capital require it, every union

should reserve its right to stop work at any moment when the interests

of the union or of labor require it. Temporary arrangements are entered

into which are binding as to all other matters except the cessation of

work. That this cessation would not occur in any well-organized union

over trifles goes without saying--strikes are tremendously costly to

labor. The agreement binds in a way perfectly familiar to the business

world in the call loan or the tenancy at will.

President Moyer of the Western Federation (one of those Mr. Roosevelt

called an "undesirable citizen" at the time when he was on trial in

Idaho, accused of being an accomplice in the murder of Governor

Steunenburg) explained that his union knew that agreements might bring

certain momentary advantages which it would otherwise lose, that it had

often been in a position to win higher wages through an agreement, and

in three cases even to gain a seven-hour day. But by such action, he

declared the union would have surrendered its freedom. It would have

been tied hand and foot, whereas now it was free to fight whenever it

wanted to. If working people want to be united and effective, he

concluded, they must have the fullest freedom of action. This would

always pay in the end.

In view of the great advance in the organization and fighting spirit of

labor secured by this new kind of industrial warfare, some

revolutionary unionists even expect it to do more to bring about

Socialism than the Socialist parties themselves. Indeed, a few have gone

so far as to regard these parties as almost superfluous. Many of the new

revolutionary unionists, though Socialists by conviction, attach so

little importance to political action that they have formed no

connection with the Socialist parties, and do not propose to do so.

Others feel the necessity of some political support, and contend that

any kind of an exclusively labor union party, even if it represents

anti-revolutionary unions like most of those of the Federation of Labor,

would serve this purpose better than the Socialist Party, which belongs

less exclusively to the unionists.

An American revolutionary unionist and Socialist, the late Louis Duchez,

like many of his school, not only placed his faith chiefly in the

unskilled workers, either excluding the skilled manual laborers and the

brain workers, or relegating them to a secondary position, but wanted

the new organizations to rely almost entirely on their economic efforts

and entirely to subordinate political action. The hours of labor are to

be reduced, child labor is to be abolished, and everything is to be done

that will tend to diminish competition between one workingman and

another, he argued, with the idea of securing early control of the labor

market. Through labor's restriction of output, production is to be cut

down and the unemployed are to be absorbed. Thus, he declared, "_a

partial expropriation of capital is taking place_" and "_this

constructive program is followed until the workers get all they

produce_."[259]

Here is an invaluable insight into the underlying standpoint of some of

these anti-political "syndicalists," to use a term that has come to us

from France. Nothing could possibly be more alien to the whole spirit of

revolutionary Socialism than these conclusions. The very reason for the

existence of Socialism is that Socialists believe that the unions cannot

control the labor market in present society. The Socialists' chief hope,

moreover, is that economic evolution will make possible and almost

inevitable the transformation of a capitalist into a Socialist society;

it is then to their interest not to retard the development of industry

by the restriction of output, but to advance it. Indeed, Mr. Duchez's

philosophy is not that of Socialist labor unionism, but of anarchist

labor unionism, and there have been strong tendencies in many

countries, not only in France and Italy, but also in the United States,

especially among the more conservative unions, to be guided by such a

policy. It is the essence of Mr. Gompers's program, as I have shown, to

claim that "a partial expropriation of capital" is taking place through

the unions, and that by this means, _without any government action_, and

_without any revolutionary general strike_ the workers will gradually

"get all they produce." According to the Socialist view, such a gradual

expropriation can only _begin_ after a _political and economic_

revolution, or when, on its near approach, capitalists prefer to make

vital concessions rather than to engage in such a conflict.

The leading Socialist monthly in America, the _International Socialist

Review_, which has indorsed the new unionism, has even found it

necessary recently to remind its readers that the Socialist Party does

after all play a certain rôle and a more or less important one, in the

revolutionary movement. "Representative revolutionary unionists, like

Lagardelle of France and Tom Mann of Australia," said the _Review_,

"point out the immense value of a political party _as an auxiliary_ to

the unions. A revolutionary union without the backing of a revolutionary

party will be tied up by injunctions. Its officers will be kidnapped.

Its members, if they defy the courts, will be corralled in bull pens or

mowed down by Gatling guns.

"A revolutionary party, on the other hand, if it pins its hopes mainly

to the passing of laws, tends always to degenerate into a reform party.

Its 'leaders' become hungry for office and eager for votes, even if the

votes must be secured by concessions to the middle class. In the pursuit

of such votes it wastes its propaganda on immediate demands."

The _Review_ adds, however, that a non-political menace of revolution

does ten times as much for reforms as any political activity; which can

only mean that in its estimation revolutionary strikes, boycotts,

demonstrations, etc., are of ten times higher present value than the

ballot.

Mr. Tom Mann seems also to subordinate political to labor union action:

"Experience in all countries shows most conclusively that industrial

organization, intelligently conducted, is of much more moment than

political action, for, entirely irrespective as to which school of

politicians is in power, capable and courageous industrial activity

forces from the politicians proportionate concessions.... Indeed, it is

obvious that a growing proportion of the intelligent pioneers of

economic changes are expressing more and more dissatisfaction with

Parliament and all its works, and look forward to the time when

Parliaments, as we know them, will be superseded by the people managing

their own affairs by means of the Initiative and the Referendum."[260]

The last sentence shows that Mr. Mann had somewhat modified his aversion

to politics, for the Initiative and Referendum is a political and not an

economic device. His objection to politics in the form of

parliamentarism (that is, trusting everything to elected persons, or

_representatives_) as distinguished from direct democracy, would

probably meet the views of the majority of Socialists everywhere (except

in Great Britain).

A later declaration of Mr. Mann after his return from Australia to

England shows that he now occupies the same ground as Debs and Haywood

in America--favoring a revolutionary party as well as revolutionary

unions:--

"The present-day degradation of so large a percentage of the

workers is directly due to their economic enslavement; and it is

economic freedom that is demanded.

"Now Parliamentary action is at all times useful, in proportion as

it makes for economic emancipation of the workers. But Socialists

and Labour men in Parliament can only do effective work there in

proportion to the intelligence and economic organization of the

rank and file....

"Certainly nothing very striking in the way of constructive work

could reasonably be expected from the minorities of the Socialists

and Labour men hitherto elected. But the most moderate and

fair-minded are compelled to declare that, not in one country but

in all, a proportion of those comrades who, prior to being

returned, were unquestionably revolutionary, are no longer so after

a few years in Parliament. They are revolutionary neither in their

attitude towards existing society nor in respect of present-day

institutions. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that many seem

to have constituted themselves apologists for existing society,

showing a degree of studied respect for bourgeois conditions, and a

toleration of bourgeois methods, that destroys the probability of

their doing any real work of a revolutionary character.

"I shall not here attempt to juggle with the quibble of 'Revolution

or Evolution,'--or to meet the contention of some of those under

consideration that it is not Revolution that is wanted. 'You cannot

change the world and yet not change the world.' _Revolution is the

means of, not the alternative to, Evolution._ I simply state that a

working-class movement that is not revolutionary in character, is

not of the slightest use to the working class."[261]

If Mr. Mann later resigned from the British Social Democratic Party,

this was in part due to the special conditions in Great Britain, as he

said at the time, and partly to his Australian experience of the

demoralizing effects of office seeking on the Labour Party there. Mann

stands with Hervé in the French Party and Debs and Haywood in the

American. The reasons given for his withdrawal from the British Party

embody the universal complaint of revolutionary unionists against what

is everywhere a strong tendency of Socialist parties to become

demoralized like other political organizations. Mr. Mann, in his letter

of resignation, said:--

"After the most careful reflection I am driven to the belief that

the real reason why the trade unionist movement of this country is

in such a deplorable state of inefficiency is to be found in the

fictitious importance which the workers have been encouraged to

attach to parliamentary action.

"I find nearly all the serious-minded young men in the Labour and

Socialist movement have their minds centered upon obtaining some

position in public life, such as local, municipal, or county

councilorship, or filling some governmental office, or aspiring to

become a member of Parliament.

"I am driven to the belief that this is entirely wrong, and that

economic liberty will never be realized by such means. So I declare

in favor of Direct Industrial Organization, not as _a_ means but as

_the_ means whereby the workers can ultimately overthrow the

capitalist system and become the actual controllers of their own

industrial and social destiny."

There is little disagreement among Socialists that "Direct Industrial

Organization" is likely to prove the most important means by which "the

workers can ultimately overthrow the capitalist system." This, the

"industrial unionism" of Debs and Haywood and Mann, is to be sharply

distinguished from French "syndicalism" which undermines all Socialist

political action and all revolutionary economic action as well, by

teaching that even to-day by direct industrial organization--without a

political program or political support, and without a revolution--"a

partial expropriation of capital is taking place."

The advocates of revolutionary labor unionism in America for the most

part are not allowing the new idea to draw away their energies from the

Socialist Party; it merely serves to emphasize their hostility to the

present unaggressive policy of the Executive American Federation of

Labor and some of the unions that compose it.

Mr. Haywood (another of Mr. Roosevelt's "undesirable citizens") urges

the working class to "become so organized on the economic field that

they can take and hold the industries in which they are employed." This

view might seem to obviate the need of a political party, but Mr.

Haywood does not regard it in that light. He says:--

"There is justification for political action, and that is, to

control the forces of the capitalists that they use against us; to

be in a position to control the power of government so as to make

the work of the army ineffective.... That is the reason that you

want the power of government. That is the reason that you should

fully understand the power of the ballot.

"Now, there isn't any one, Socialist, S.L.P., Industrial Worker, or

any other working man or woman, no matter what society you belong

to, but what believes in the ballot. There are those--and I am one

of them--who refuse to have the ballot interpreted for them. I know

or think I know the power of it, and I know that the industrial

organization, as I have stated in the beginning, is its broadest

interpretation. I know, too, that when the workers are brought

together in a great organization they are not going to cease to

vote. That is when the workers will _begin_ to vote, to vote for

directors to operate the industries in which they are all

employed."

In the recent pamphlet, "Industrial Socialism," Mr. Haywood and Mr.

Frank Bonn develop the new unionism at greater length. Their conclusions

as to politics are directed, not against the Socialist Party, but

against its non-revolutionary elements:--

"The Socialist Party stands not merely for the POLITICAL supremacy

of labor. It stands for the INDUSTRIAL supremacy of labor. Its

purpose is not to secure old age pensions and free meals for school

children. Its mission is to help overthrow capitalism and establish

Socialism.

"The great purpose of the Socialist Party is to seize the powers of

government and thus prevent them from being used by the capitalists

against the workers. With Socialists in political offices the

workers can strike and not be shot. They can picket shops and not

be arrested and imprisoned.... To win the demands made on the

industrial field it is absolutely necessary to control the

government, as experience shows strikes to have been lost through

the interference of courts and militia. The same functions of

government, controlled by a class conscious working class, will be

used to inspire confidence and compel the wheels of industry to

move in spite of the devices and stumblingblocks of the

capitalists....

"Socialist government will concern itself entirely with the shop.

Socialism can demand nothing of the individual outside the shop....

It has no concern with the numberless social reforms which the

capitalists are now preaching in order to save their miserable

profit system.

"Old age pensions are not Socialism. The workers had much better

fight for higher wages and shorter hours. Old age pensions under

the present government are either charity doled out to paupers, or

bribes given to voters by politicians. Self-respecting workers

despise such means of support. Free meals or cent meals for

poverty-stricken school children are not Socialism. Industrial

freedom will enable parents to give their children solid food at

home. Free food to the workers cuts wages and kills the fighting

spirit."

The American "syndicalists" are not opposed to political action, but

they want to use it _exclusively_ for the purposes of industrial

democracy.

While Messrs. Haywood and Bohn by no means take an anarchistic position,

they show no enthusiasm for the capitalist-collectivist proposals that

_present governments_ should take control of industry. They are not

hostile to all government, but they think that democracy applied

directly to industry would be all the government required:--

"In the shop there must be government. In the school there must be

government. In the conduct of the great public services there must

be government. We have shown that Socialism will make government

democratic throughout. The basis of this freedom will be the

freedom of the individual to develop his powers. People will be

educated in freedom. They will work in freedom. They will live in

freedom....

"Socialism will establish democracy in the shop. Democracy in the

shop will free the working class. The working class, through

securing freedom for itself, will liberate the race."

Even the American "syndicalists," however, attach more importance to

economic than to political action. Hitherto revolutionary Socialists

have agreed that the only constructive work possible _under capitalism_

was that of education and organization. The "syndicalists" also agree

that nothing peculiarly socialistic can be done to-day by _political_

action, but they are reformists as to the immediate possibilities of

_economic_ action. Here they believe revolutionary principles can be

applied even under capitalism. Even the conservative and purely

businesslike effort to secure a little more wages by organized action,

they believe, can be converted here and now into a class struggle of

working class _vs._ capitalists. What is needed is only organization of

all the unions and a revolutionary policy. With the possibilities of a

revolutionary union policy when capitalism has largely exhausted its

program of political reforms and economic betterment and when Socialism

has become the political Opposition, I deal in following chapters. But

syndicalists, even in America, say revolutionary tactics can be applied

now--Mr. Haywood, for instance, feels that the only thing necessary for

a successful revolutionary and Socialistic general strike in France or

America to-day, is sufficient economic organization.

Mr. Debs admits the need of revolutionary tactics as well as

revolutionary principles and even says: "We could better succeed with

reactionary principles and revolutionary tactics than with revolutionary

principles and reactionary tactics." He admits also that Socialists and

revolutionary unionists are inspired with an entirely new attitude

towards society and government and indorses as _entirely sound_ certain

expressions from Haywood and Bohn's pamphlet which had been violently

attacked by reformist Socialists and conservative unionists. Mr. Debs

agrees with the former writers in their definition of the attitude of

the Socialist revolutionist's attitude towards property: "He retains

absolutely no respect for the property 'rights' of the profit takers. He

will use any weapon which will win his fight. He knows that the present

laws of property are made by and for the capitalists. Therefore he does

not hesitate to break them." But he does not agree that this new spirit

offers any positive contribution to Socialist tactics at the present

time. Just as Hervé has recently admitted that the superior political

and economic organization of the Germans were more important than all

the "sabotage" (violence) and "direct action" of the French though he

still favors the latter policies, so the foremost American revolutionary

opposes "direct action" and "sabotage" altogether under present

conditions. Both deny that revolutionary economic action under

capitalism is any more promising than revolutionary political action.

Even Hervé defends his more or less friendly attitude to "direct action"

wholly on the ground that it is good _practice_ for revolution, not on

Lagardelle's syndicalist ground that it means the beginning of

revolution itself (see below).

By much of their language Haywood and several industrial unionists of

this country would seem to class themselves rather with Lagardelle and

Labriola (see below) than with Hervé, Debs, and Mann. Haywood, for

example, has said that no Socialist can be a law-abiding citizen.

Haywood's very effective and law-abiding leadership in strikes at

Lawrence (1912) and elsewhere would suggest that he meant that

Socialists cannot be law-abiding by principle and under all

circumstances. But this statement as it was made, together with many

others, justifies the above classification. Debs, on the contrary,

claims that the American workers are law-abiding and must remain so, on

the whole, until the time of the revolution approaches. "As a

revolutionist," he writes, "I can have no respect for capitalist

property laws, nor the least scruple about violating them," but Debs

does not believe there can be any occasion to put this principle into

effect until the workers have been politically and economically

organized and educated, and then only if they are opposed by violence

(see the _International Socialist Review_, February, 1912).

The French and Italian advocates of revolutionary unionism also assign

to the party a very secondary part, though they are by no means, like

the anarchists, opposed to all political action. They do not as a rule

oppose the Socialist parties, but they protest against the view that

Socialist activities should be chiefly political. Their best-known

spokesman in Italy, Arturo Labriola, one of the most brilliant orators

in the country, and a professor in the University of Naples, writes:--

"The Social Democracy will prove to have been the last capitalistic

party to which the defense of capitalistic society will have been

intrusted. The syndicalists [revolutionary unionists] ought to get

that firmly into their heads and draw conclusions from it in their

_necessary_ relations with the official Socialist Party. _The

latter ought to resign itself to being no more than a simple party

of the legal demands of the proletariat [i.e. the unions,] on the

basis of existing society, and not an anti-capitalist party._"[262]

This is strong language and brings up some large questions. Far from

being displeased with the moderate and non-revolutionary character of

the Socialist Party, Labriola, himself a revolutionist, is so

indifferent to the party as a direct means to revolution, as to hope

that it will drop its revolutionary claims altogether and become a

humble and modest but more useful tool of the unions. He even admitted

in conversation with the writer that, attaching no value to political

advance as such, he was not even anxious at this time that the

illiterate South Italians should be given a vote, since they would long

remain under the tutelage of the Catholic Church.

One of the founders of the present French movement, its earliest and

chief theorist, Pelloutier, who has many followers among the present

officials of the French Federation of Labor, went even further, denying

to the government, and therefore to all political parties, any vital

function whatever. To Pelloutier the State is built exclusively upon

"superfluous and obnoxious political interests." The unions are expected

to work towards a Socialist society without much, if any, political

support. They are to use non-political means: "The general strike as a

purely economic means that _excludes the coöperation_ of parliamentary

Socialists and demands only labor union activity would necessarily suit

the labor union groups."[263]

The leading "syndicalist" writer to-day, Hubert Lagardelle, feels not

only that a Socialist Party is not likely to bring about a Socialist

society, but that any steps that it might try to take in this direction

to-day would necessarily be along the wrong lines, since it would

establish reforms by law rather than as a natural upgrowth out of

economic conditions and the activities of labor unions, with the result

that such reforms would necessarily go no farther than "State

Socialism."[264]

Lagardelle speaks of the "State Socialistic" reform tendency as

synonymous with "modern democracy." Because it supposes that there are

"general problems common to all classes," says Lagardelle, democracy

refuses to take into account the real difference between men, which is

that they are divided into economic classes. Here we see the central

principle of Socialism exaggerated to an absurdity. Few Socialists, even

the most revolutionary, would deny that there are some problems "common

to all classes." Indeed, the existence and importance of such problems

is the very reason why "State Socialism," of benefit to the masses, but

still more to the interest of the capitalists, is being so easily and

rapidly introduced. Lagardelle would be right, from the Socialist

standpoint, if he demanded that it should oppose mere political

democracy, or "State Socialism" in proportion as these forces have

succeeded in reorganizing the capitalist State--or rather after they

have been assimilated by it. But to obstruct their present work is

merely to stand against the normal and necessary course of economic and

political evolution, as recognized by the Socialists themselves, a

similar mistake to that made by the Populists and their successors, who

think they can prevent normal economic evolution by dissolving the new

industrial combinations and returning to competition. Just as Socialists

cannot oppose the formation of trusts under normal circumstances,

neither can they oppose the extension of the modern State into the field

of industry or democratic reform, even though the result is

_temporarily_ to strengthen capitalism and to decrease the economic and

political power of the working people. One of the fundamental

differences between the Socialist and other political philosophies is

that it recognizes ceaseless political evolution and acts accordingly.

It teaches that we shall probably pass on to social democracy through a

period of monopoly rule, "State Socialism," and political reforms that

in themselves promise no relative advance, economic or political, to the

working class.

In a recent congress of the French Party, Jaurès protested against a

statement of Lagardelle's that Socialism was opposed to democracy.

"Democracy," Lagardelle answered, "corresponds to an historical movement

which has come to an end; syndicalism is an anti-democratic movement to

the extent that it is post-democratic. Syndicalism comes after

democracy; it perfects the life which democracy was powerless to

organize." It is difficult to understand why Lagardelle persists in

saying that a movement which thus supplements democracy, which does what

democracy was claiming to do, and which is expected to supersede it,

should on this account be considered as "anti-democratic." Socialism

fights the "State Socialists" and opposes those whose democracy is

merely political, but it is attacking not their democracy or their

"State Socialism," but their capitalism.

"Political society," says Lagardelle, "being the organization of the

coercive power of the State, that is to say, of authority and the

hierarchy, corresponds to an economic régime which has authority and the

hierarchy as its base."[265] This proposition (the truth of which all

Socialists would recognize in so far as it applies to political society

in its present form) seems sufficient to Lagardelle to justify his

conclusion that we can no more expect Socialist results through the

State, than we could by association with capitalism. He does not agree

with the Socialist majority that, while capitalism embodies a ruling

class whose services may be dispensed with, the State is rather a

machine or a system which corresponds not so much to capitalism, as to

the system and machinery of industry which capitalism controls.

Another and closely related idea of the syndicalists is that all

political parties, as well as governments, necessarily become the tools

of their leaders, that they always become "machines," bureaucratically

organized like governments. Lagardelle adopts Rousseau's view that the

essence of representative government (all existing governments that are

not autocratic being representative) is "the inactivity of the citizen"

and urges that political parties, like society in general, are divided

between the governing and the governed. While there is much truth in

this analysis,--this being the situation which it is sought to correct

both in government and within political parties by such means as direct

legislation and the recall,--Lagardelle does not seem to see that

exactly the same problem exists also in the labor unions. For among the

most revolutionary as among the most conservative of labor organizations

the leaders tend to acquire the same relative and irresponsible power as

they do in political parties. The difficulty of making democracy work

inheres in all organizations. It must be met and overcome; it cannot be

avoided.

Lagardelle's distrust of political democracy goes even further than a

mere criticism of representative government. He thinks the citizen

to-day unable to judge general political questions at all,--so that in

his view even direct democracy would be useless. It is for this reason,

he says, that parties have it as an aim to act and to think in the

citizen's place. Lagardelle's remedy is not the establishment of direct

democracy in government or in parties, but the organization of the

people to act together on "the concrete things of life"; that is, on

questions of hours, wages, and other conditions closely associated with

their daily life and in his view adapted to their understanding. He does

not seem to see that such questions lead almost immediately, not only to

such larger issues as are already presented by the leading political

parties, but also to the still larger ones proposed by the Socialists.

Others of the syndicalists' criticisms, if taken literally, would

undoubtedly bring them in the end to the position occupied by

non-Socialist and anti-Socialist labor unionists. Lagardelle frankly

places labor union action not only above political action, which

Socialists, under many circumstances, may justify, but above Socialism

itself. "Even if the dreams of the future of syndicalistic Socialism

should never be realized,--none of us has the secret of history,--it

would suffice for me to give it my full support, to know that it is at

the moment I am speaking the essential agent of civilization in the

world." Here is a labor union partisanship which is certainly not

equaled by the average conservative labor leader, who has the modesty to

realize that there are other powerful forces making for progress aside

from the movement to which he happens to belong.

The syndicalists, or those who act along similar lines in other

countries, have brought new life into the Socialist movement; their

criticism has forced it to consider some neglected questions, and has

contributed new ideas which are winning acceptance. The basis of their

view is that the working people cannot win by mere numbers or

intelligence, but must have a practical power to organize along

radically new lines and an ability to create new social institutions

independently of capitalist opposition or aid.

Lagardelle writes: "There is nothing in syndicalism which can

recall the dogmatism of orthodox Socialism. The latter has summed

up its wisdom in certain abstract immovable formulas which it

intends willy-nilly to impose on life.... Syndicalism, on the

contrary, depends on the continually renewed and spontaneous

creations of life itself, on the perpetual renewing of ideas, which

cannot become fixed into dogmas as long as they are not detached

from their trunk. We are not dealing with a body of intellectuals,

with a Socialist clergy charged to think for the working class, but

with the working class itself, which through its own experience is

incessantly discovering new horizons, unseen perspectives,

unsuspected methods,--in a word, new sources of rejuvenation."[266]

Here, at least, is a valuable warning to Socialism against what its most

revolutionary and enthusiastic adherents have always felt is its chief

danger.

The fact that lends force to Lagardelle's argument is that the average

workingman has a much more important, necessary, and continuous function

to fill as a member of the labor unions than as a member of the

Socialist parties. It still remains a problem of the first magnitude to

every Socialist party to give to its members an equally powerful daily

interest in that work. On the other hand, it must be said in all

fairness that the lack of active participation by the rank and file is

very common in the labor unions also, a handful of men often governing

and directing, sometimes even at the most critical moments.

It is the boast of the syndicalists that in their plan of revolutionary

unionism, practice and theory become one, that actions become

revolutionary as well as words--"Men are classed," says Lagardelle,

"according to their acts and not according to their labels. The

revolutionary spirit comes down from heaven onto the earth, becomes

flesh, manifests itself by institutions, and identifies itself with

life. The daily act takes on a revolutionary value, and social

transformation, if it comes some day, will only be the generalization of

this act." It is true that Lagardelle's "direct action" tends towards

revolution, but does it tend towards Socialism? His answer is that it

does. But his answer itself indicates the tendency of syndicalism to

drift back into conservative unionism and the mere demand for somewhat

more wages. Socialist organizations, he says, "must necessarily be

trained in _actions_ of no great revolutionary moment, since these are

the only kind of _actions_ now possible, and in agitation; that is, the

conversion or the wakening of the will of the working people to desire

and to demand an entirely different life, which their intelligence has

shown them to be possible, and which they feel they are able to obtain

through their organizations."[267] (My italics.)

Not all members of the French "syndicats" (labor unions) are theoretical

syndicalists of the dogmatic kind, like Lagardelle. Yet even men like

Guerard, recently head of the railway union, and Niel of the printers,

recently secretary of the Federation of Labor, both belonging to the

less radical faction, are in favor of the use of the general strike

under several contingencies, and stand for a union policy directed

towards the ultimate abolition of employers. But this does not mean that

they believe the unions can succeed in either of these efforts if acting

alone, or even if assisted in Parliament by a party which represents

only the unions, acts as their tool, and therefore brings them no

outside assistance. Such men, together with others more radical, like

André and the Guesdists in the Federation, realize that a larger and

more democratic movement is needed in connection with the unions before

there is any possibility of accomplishing the great social changes at

which, as Socialists, they aim. (As evidence, see the proceedings of any

recent convention of the Confederation Generale de Travail.)

Lagardelle, however, is a member of the Socialist Party and was recently

even a candidate for the French Chamber of Deputies. Other prominent

members of the Party as revolutionary as he and as enthusiastic

partisans of the Confederation de Travail (Federation of Labor) are

stronger in their allegiance to the Party. And there are signs that even

in France syndicalism is losing its anti-political tendency. Hervé, who

demanded at the beginning of 1909 that the "directors of the Socialist

Party cure themselves of 'Parliamentary idiocy'" (his New Year's wish),

expressed at the beginning of 1910 the wish that "certain of the

dignitaries of the Federation of Labor should cure themselves of a

syndicalist and laborite idiocy, a form of idiocy not less dangerous or

clownish than the other."

In fact, it may soon be necessary to distinguish a new school of

political syndicalism, which is well represented by Paul Louis in his

"Syndicalism against the State" (Le Syndicalisme contre l'État).

"Syndicalism is at the bottom," says Louis, "only a powerful

expression of that destructive and constructive effort which for

years has been shaking the old political and social régime, and is

undermining slowly the ancient system of property. It points

necessarily to collectivism and communism. It represents Socialism

in action, in daily and continuous action....

"Now the abolition of the State ... is the object of modern

Socialism. What distinguishes this modern Socialism from Utopian

Socialism which culminated towards 1848, whose best-known

publicists were Cabet, Pecqueur, Louis Blanc, Vidal, is precisely

that it no longer attributes to the State the power to transform,

the capacity to revolutionize, the rôle of magic regeneration,

which the writers in this dangerous phase of enthusiasm assigned to

it. For the Utopians all the machinery of a bureaucracy could be

put at the service of all the classes, fraternally reconciled in

view of the coming social regeneration. For contemporary Socialists

since Karl Marx ... this bureaucratic machinery, whose function is

to protect the existing system and to maintain an administrative,

economic, financial, political, and military guardianship must

finally be disintegrated. The new society can only be born at this

price.

"There still exist in all countries groups of men or isolated

individuals who stand for collectivism, who claim to want the

complete emancipation of all workers, but who nevertheless adhere

to paternalism. These are called revisionists in Germany,

reformists in France, Italy, and Switzerland.... They go back,

without knowing it, to those theories of enlightened despotism

which flourished at the end of the eighteenth century in the courts

of Vienna, St. Petersburg, Madrid and Lisbon, the ridiculous

inanity of which was sufficiently well demonstrated by events....

"But these Utopians of the present moment, these champions of a

limitless adaptation to circumstances, are destined to lose ground

more and more, according as Syndicalism expresses better and better

the independent action of the organized proletariat.

"In its totality the Socialism of the world is as anti-governmental

as Syndicalism, and in this is shown the identity of the two

movements, for it is difficult to distinguish the field of action

of the one from that of the other."[268]

We see here that the central idea of syndicalism, which is undoubtedly,

as Louis says, a revolutionary action against existing governments, is

not on this account anti-political; the foundation of this point of view

is that labor union action is bound sooner or later to evolve into

syndicalism, which in its essence is an effort to put industry in the

immediate control of the non-propertied working classes, without regard

to the attitude taken towards this movement by governments;--

"Those who have long imagined that some kind of coördination would

be brought about between old economic and social institutions and

the union organizations which would then be tolerated, those who

thought they could incorporate these industrial groups in the

mechanism of production and political society, were guilty of the

most stupefying of errors. They were ignorant both of the nature of

the State and of the essence of unionism; they were attempting the

squaring of the circle or perpetual motion; they had not analyzed

the process of disintegration which humanity is undergoing, which,

accelerated by the stream of industrialism, has given origin to

hostile classes subordinated to one another, incapable of

coexisting in a lasting equilibrium."[269]

We see here a complete agreement with the position of the revolutionary

majority among the Socialists. If syndicalism differs in any way from

other tendencies in the Socialist movement, it does so through a

difference of emphasis rather than a difference of kind. It undoubtedly

exaggerates the possibilities of economic action, and underestimates

those of political action. Louis, for example, says that the working

people are the subjects of capital, but the masters of production, that

they cannot live without suffering in the factory, but that society

cannot live without their labor. This, of course, is only true if stated

in the most unqualified form. Society is able to dispense with all labor

for a short time, and with very many classes of labor for long periods.

Moreover, the forcing of labor at the point of the rifle is by no means

so impracticable during brief emergencies as is sometimes supposed.

Syndicalism may, perhaps, be most usefully viewed as a reaction against

the tendency towards "parliamentarism" or undue emphasis on political

action, which has existed even among revolutionary Socialists in Germany

and elsewhere (see Part II, Chapter V). Among the "revisionist"

Socialists of that country a great friendliness to labor union action

existed, in view of the comparative conservatism of the unions. For this

same reason the revolutionaries became rather cold, though never

hostile, towards this form of action, and concentrated their attention

on politics. In a word, syndicalism is only to be understood in the

light of the criticisms of revolutionary Socialism as presented by

Kautsky, just as the standpoint of the latter can only be comprehended

after it is subjected to the syndicalist criticism--and doubtless both

positions, however one-sided they appear elsewhere, were fairly

justified by the economic and political situations in France and Germany

respectively. "Only as a _political_ party," says Kautsky, "can the

working class as a whole come to a firm and lasting union." He then

proceeds to argue that purely economic struggles are always limited

either to a locality, a town, or a province, or else to a given trade or

industry--the directly opposite view to that of the syndicalists, whose

one object is also, undeniably, to bring about a unity of the working

class, though they claim that this can be accomplished _only by economic

action_, while from their point of view it is political action that

always divides the working class by nation, section, and class.

"The pure and simple unionist," says Kautsky, "is conservative, even

when he behaves in a radical manner; on the other hand, every true and

independent political party [Kautsky is speaking here of workingmen's

organizations exclusively] is always revolutionary by its very nature,

even when, according to its action, or even according to the

consciousness of its members, it is still moderate." This again is the

exact opposite of the syndicalists' position. They would say that a

labor party unconnected with revolutionary economic action would

necessarily be conservative, no matter how revolutionary it seemed. The

truth from the broader revolutionary standpoint is doubtless that

neither political nor economic action in isolation can long continue to

be revolutionary. Exclusively economic action soon leads to exclusive

emphasis on material and immediate gains, without reference to the

relative position of the working class or its future; exclusively

political action leads inevitably to concentration on securing

democratic political machinery and reforms which by no means guarantee

that labor is gaining on capital in the race for power.

To Kautsky a labor party, it would seem, might be sufficient in itself,

even if economic action should, for any reason, become temporarily

impossible:--

"The formation and the activity of a special labor party which

wants to win political power for the working class already

presupposes in a part of the laboring class a highly developed

class consciousness. But the activity of this labor party is the

most powerful means to awaken and to further class consciousness in

the masses of labor, also. It knows only objects and tasks which

have to do with the whole proletariat; the trade narrowness, the

jealousies of single and separate organizations, find no place in

it."[270]

It is easy to see how an equally strong case might be made out for the

educative, unifying, and revolutionary effect of an aggressive labor

union movement without any political features. The truth would seem to

be that any form of organization that honestly represents the working

class and is at the same time militant--and no other--advances

Socialism. The objections to action exclusively political hold also

against action exclusively economic. Both trade union action as such,

which inevitably spends a large part of its energies in trying to

improve economic conditions in our _present_ society by trade agreements

and other combinations with the capitalists, and political action as

such, which is always drawn more or less into capitalistic efforts to

improve present society by political means is fundamentally

conservative. What Socialism requires is not a political party in the

ordinary sense, but political organization and a political program; not

labor unions, as the term has been understood, but aggressive and

effective economic organization, available also for the most

far-reaching economic and political ends.

It seems probable that the anti-political element in the new

revolutionary unionism will soon be outgrown. When this happens, it will

meet the revolutionary majority of the Socialists on an identical

platform. For this revolutionary majority is steadily laying on more

weight on economic organization.

FOOTNOTES:

[253] The _New York Call_, Nov. 13, 1911.

[254] Edmond Kelly, "Twentieth-Century Socialism," p. 152.

[255] The _Socialist Review_ (London), September, 1910.

[256] Winston Churchill, _op. cit._, p. 73.

[257] The _Socialist Review_ (London), October, 1911.

[258] The profound opposition between the "State Socialism" of the

Labour Party and the revolutionary aims and methods of genuine Socialism

and the new labor unionism appeared more clearly in the coal strike of

1912 than it had in the railway strike of the previous year. As Mr.

Lloyd George very truthfully remarked in Parliament, no leaders of the

Labour Party had committed themselves to syndicalism, while syndicalism

and socialism [_i.e._ the socialism of the Labour Party] were mutually

destructive. "We can console ourselves with the fact," said Mr. Lloyd

George, "that the best policeman for the syndicalists is the socialist

[_i.e._ the Labourite]."

The conduct of many of the Labour Party leaders during this strike, as

during the railway strike, fully justified the confidence of the

Chancellor of the Exchequer. Mr. MacDonald, for example, spoke of

syndicalism in much the same terms as those used by Mr. Lloyd George. He

viewed it as evil, to be obviated by greater friendliness and

consideration on the part of employers towards employees, a position

fully endorsed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the other Radicals

of the British Cabinet.

The coal strike throughout was, indeed, almost a repetition of the

railway strike. What I have said of the one applies, with comparatively

slight changes, to the other. Even the so-called Minimum Wage Law is

essentially identical with the methods adopted to determine the wages of

railway employees.

[259] The _New York Call_, April 17, 1910.

[260] The _International Socialist Review_, June, 1911.

[261] The _Industrial Syndicalist_ (London), July and September, 1910.

[262] _Le Mouvement Socialiste_ (Paris), 1909, article entitled,

"Plechanoff contre les Syndicalistes."

[263] "Le Federation des Bourses de Travail de France," p. 67.

[264] Hubert Lagardelle, Le Socialisme Ouvrier (Paris), 1911.

[265] _Le Mouvement Socialiste_, 1909, article entitled, "Classe Sociale

et Parti Politique."

[266] Hubert Lagardelle, "Syndicalisme et Socialisme" (Paris), p. 52.

[267] Hubert Lagardelle, "Syndicalisme et Socialisme" (Paris), p. 50.

[268] Paul Louis, "Le Syndicalisme contre l'État," pp. 4-7.

[269] Paul Louis, "Le Syndicalisme contre l'État," p. 244.

[270] Karl Kautsky, "Parlamentarismus und Demokratie," pp. 136 and 137.

CHAPTER VI

THE "GENERAL STRIKE"

Nearly all strikes are more or less justified in Socialist eyes. But

those that involve neither a large proportion of the working class nor

any broad social or political question are held to be of secondary

importance. On the other hand, the "sympathetic" and "general" strikes,

which are on such a scale as to become great public issues, and are

decided by the attitude of public opinion and the government rather than

by the employers and employees involved, are viewed as a most essential

part of the class struggle, especially when in their relation to

probable future contingencies.

The social significance of such sympathetic or general strikes is indeed

recognized as clearly by non-Socialists as by Socialists--even in

America, since the great railroad strike of 1894. The general strike of

1910 in Philadelphia, for instance, was seen both in Philadelphia and in

the country at large as being a part of a great social conflict. "The

American nation has been brought face to face for the first time with a

strike," said the _Philadelphia North American_, "not merely against the

control of an industry or a group of allied industries, but _a strike of

class against class, with the lines sharply drawn_.... And it is this

antagonism, this class war, intangible and immeasurable, that

constitutes the largest and most lamentable hurt to the city. It is,

moreover, felt beyond the city and throughout the entire nation." (My

italics). It goes without saying that all organs of non-Socialist

opinion feel that such threatening disturbances are lamentable, for they

certainly may lead towards a revolutionary situation. Both in this

country and Great Britain the great railway strike of 1911 was almost

universally regarded in this light.

The availability of a general strike on a national scale as a means of

assaulting capitalism at some future crisis or as a present means of

defending the ballot or the rights of labor organizations or of

preventing a foreign war, has for the past decade been the center of

discussion at many European Socialist congresses. The recent Prime

Minister of France, Briand, was long one of the leading partisans of

this method of which he said only a few years before he became Premier:

"It has the seductive quality that it is after all the exercise of an

incontestable right. It is a revolution which commences with legality.

In refusing the yoke of misery, the workingman revolts in the fullness

of his rights; illegality is committed by the capitalist class when it

becomes a provocator by trying to violate a right which it has itself

consecrated." That Briand meant what he said is indicated by the advice

he gave to soldiers who might be ordered to fire against the strikers in

such a crisis. "If the order to fire should persist," said Briand, "if

the tenacious officer should wish to constrain the will of the soldiers

in spite of all.... Oh, no doubt the guns might go off, but it might not

be in the direction ordered"--and the universal assumption of all public

opinion at that time and since was that he was advising the soldiers

that under these circumstances they would be justified in shooting their

officers.

The Federation of Labor of France has long adopted the idea of the

general strike as appropriate for certain future contingencies, as has

also the French Socialist Party--"To realize the proposed plan," the

Federation declares, "it will be necessary first of all to put the

locomotives in a condition where they can do no harm, to stop the

circulation of the railways, to encourage the soldiers to ground their

arms."

As thus conceived by Briand and the Federation, few will question the

revolutionary character of the proposed general strike. But in what

circumstances do the Socialists expect to be able to make use of this

weapon? The Socialists of many countries have given the question careful

consideration in hundreds of writings and thousands of meetings,

including national and international congresses. Through the gradual

evolution of the plans of action developed in all these conferences and

discussions, they have come to distinguish sharply between a really

general strike, _e.g._ a nation-wide railroad strike, when used for

revolutionary purposes, and other species of widespread strikes which

have merely a tendency in a revolutionary direction, such as the

Philadelphia trouble I have mentioned, and they have decided from these

deliberations, as well as considerable actual experience, just what

forms of general strike are most promising and under what contingencies

each form is most appropriate. Henriette Roland-Holst has summed up the

whole discussion and its conclusions in an able monograph (indorsed by

Kautsky and others) from which I shall resume a few of the leading

points.[271] She concludes that railroad strikes for higher wages,

unless for some modest advance approved by a large part of the public,

like the recent British strike (which, in view of the rising cost of

living, was literally to maintain "a living wage"), can only lead to a

ferocious repression. For a nation-wide railroad strike is paid for by

the whole nation, and its benefits must be nation-wide if it is to

secure the support of that part of the public without which it is

foredoomed to failure. Otherwise, says Roland-Holst, "the greater has

been the success of the working people at the beginning, the greater has

been the terror of the middle classes," and as a consequence the

measures of repression in the end have been proportionately desperate.

But this applies only when such strikes are for aggressive ends, like

that of 1910 in France, and promise nothing to any element of society

except the employees immediately involved.

If a nation-wide railroad strike or a prolonged coal strike is

aggressive, it will inevitably be lost unless it has a definite public

object. And the only aggressive political aim that would justify, in the

minds of any but those immediately involved, all the suffering and

disorder a railroad strike of any duration would entail, would be a

social revolution to effect the capture of government and industry. The

only other circumstances in which such a strike might be employed with

that support of a part at least of the public which is essential to its

success would be as a last resort, when some great social injustice was

about to be perpetrated, like a declaration of war, or an effort to

destroy the Socialist Party or the labor unions. Jaurès says rightly,

that even then it would be "a last and desperate means less suited to

save one's self than to injure the enemy."

These conclusions as to the possibilities and limitations of the general

strike are based on a careful study of the military and other powers of

the existing governments. "The power of the modern State," says

Roland-Holst, "is superior to that of the working class in all its

_material_ bases either of a political or of an economic character. The

fact of political strikes can change this in no way. The working class

can no more conquer economically, through starvation, than it can

through the use of powers of the same kind which the State employs,

that is, through force. In only one point is the working class

altogether superior to the ruling class--in purpose.... Governmental and

working class organizations are of entirely different dimensions. The

first is a coercive, the second a voluntary, organization. The power of

the first rests primarily on its means of physical force; that of the

latter, which lacks these means, can break the physical superiority of

the State only by its moral superiority." It is almost needless to add

that by "moral superiority" Roland-Holst means something quite concrete,

the willingness of the working people to perform tasks and make

sacrifices for the Socialist cause that they would not make for the

State even under compulsion. It is only through advantages of this kind,

which it is expected will greatly increase with the future growth of the

movement, that Socialists believe that, supported by an overwhelming

majority of the people, a time may arrive when they can make a

successful use of the nation-wide general strike. It is hoped that the

support of the masses of the population will then make it impossible for

governments to operate the railroads by military means, as they have

hitherto done in Russia, Hungary, France, and other countries. It is

thought by many that the general strike of 1905 in Russia, for example,

might have attained far greater and more lasting results if the peasants

had been sufficiently aroused and intelligent to destroy the bridges and

tracks, and it is not doubted that a Socialist agricultural population

consisting largely of laborers (see Chapter II) would do this in such a

crisis.

Here, then, are the two conditions under which it is thought by

Roland-Holst and the majority of Socialists that the general strike may

some day prove the chief means of bringing about a revolution: the

active support of the majority of the people, and the superior

organization and methods and the revolutionary purpose of the working

classes.

In the preparation of the working people to bring about a general strike

when the proper time arrives, lies a limitless field for immediate

Socialist activity. Both Jaurès and Bebel feel that it is even likely

that the general strike will also have to be used on a somewhat smaller

scale even before the supreme crisis comes. Jaurès thinks that it will

be needed to bring about essential reforms or to prevent war, and Bebel

believes that it will very likely have to be used to defend existing

political and economic rights of the working class; in other words, to

protect the Party and the unions from destruction. At the Congress at

Jena in 1905 the conservative trade union official, von Elm, together

with a majority of the speakers, argued that it was possible that an

attempt would be made to take away from the German working people the

right of suffrage, the freedom of the press and assemblage and the right

of organization. In such a case he and others advocate a general strike,

though he said he fully realized it would be a bloody one. "We must

reckon with this," he said. "As a matter of course, we wish to shed no

blood, but our enemies drive us into the situation.... The moment comes

when you must be ready to give up your blood and your property [here he

was interrupted by stormy applause]. Prepare yourselves for this

possibility. Our youths must be brought up so that among the soldiers

here and there will be a man who will think twice before he shoots at

his father and mother [as Kaiser Wilhelm publicly insists he must], and

at the same time at freedom." The reception of von Elm's speech showed

that his words represented the feeling of the whole German movement.

Bebel spoke with the same decision, advocating the use of the general

strike under the same conditions as did von Elm, while at the next

congress at Mannheim he declared that it would also be justified, under

certain circumstances, not only for protecting existing rights, but for

extending them, _e.g._ for the purpose of obtaining universal and equal

suffrage in Prussia. Bebel did not think that the party or the unions

were strong enough at that moment to use the general strike for other

than defensive purposes, but he said that, if they were able to double

their strength,--and it now seems they will have accomplished this

within a very few years,--then the time would doubtless arrive when it

would be worth while to risk the employment of this rather desperate

measure for aggressive purposes also.

While Socialism is thus traveling steadily in the direction of a

revolutionary general strike, capitalist governments are coming to

regard every strike of the first importance as a sort of rebellion. In

discussing the Socialist possibilities of a national railroad strike,

Roland-Holst, representing the usual Socialist view, says that it makes

very little difference whether the roads are nationally or privately

owned; in either case such a strike is likely to be considered by

capitalistic governments as something like rebellion.

But while this applies only to the employees of the most important

services like railroads, when privately operated, it applies practically

to _all_ government employees; there is an almost universal tendency to

regard strikes against the government as being mutiny--an evidence of

the profoundly capitalistic character of government ownership and "State

Socialism" which propose to multiply the number of such employees. Here,

too, the probable governmental attitude towards a future general strike

is daily indicated.

President Nicholas Murray Butler, of Columbia University, has written

that any strike of "servants of the State, in any capacity--military,

naval, or civil," should be considered both treason and mutiny.

"In my judgment loyalty and _treason_," he writes, "ought to mean

the same thing in the civil service that they do in military and

naval services. The door to get out is always open if one does not

wish to serve the public on these terms. Indeed, I am not sure that

as civilization progresses loyalty and _treason_ in the civil

services will not become more important and more vital than loyalty

and _treason_ in the military and naval services. The happiness and

the prosperity of a community might be more easily wrecked by the

paralysis of its postal and telegraph services, for example, than

by a mutiny on shipboard.... President Roosevelt's attitude on all

this was at times very sound, but he wabbled a good deal in dealing

with specific cases. In the celebrated Miller Case at the

Government Printing Office he laid down in his published letter

what I conceive to be the sound doctrine in regard to this matter.

It was then made plain to the printers that to leave their work

under pretense of striking was to resign, in effect, the places

which they held in the public service, and that if those places

were vacated they would be filled in accordance with the provisions

of the civil service act, and not by reappointment of the old

employees after parley and compromise.... To me the situation which

this problem presents is, beyond comparison, the most serious and

the most far-reaching which the modern democracies have to face."

Dr. Butler concludes that this question "will wreck every

democratic government in the world unless it is faced sturdily and

bravely now, and settled on righteous lines." (My italics.)[272]

Our Ex-President, however, has ceased apparently to "wabble." In Mr.

Roosevelt's medium, the _Outlook_, an editorial on the strike of the

municipal street cleaners of New York City reads in part as follows:--

_Men who are employed by the public cannot strike. They can, and

sometimes they do, mutiny. When they should be treated not as

strikers but as mutineers._

This issue was presented by the refusal of the men to do what they

were ordered to do. _When soldiers do that in warfare they are

given short shrift._ Of course, in combating accumulating dirt and

its potent ally, disease, an army of street cleaners is not face to

face with any such acute public dangers as those confronting a

military force; and therefore insubordination among street cleaners

does not call for any such severity as that which is absolutely

necessary in war times; _but the principle in the one case is the

same as that in the other--those who disrupt the forces of public

defense range themselves on the side of the public enemy_. They are

not in any respect on the same basis as the employees of a private

employer. _They are wage earners only in the sense that soldiers

are wage earners._[273]

When Senator La Follette indorsed the right of railway mail clerks to

organize, President Taft said (May 14, 1911):--

"This presents a very serious question, and one which, if decided

in favor of the right of government employees to strike and use the

boycott, will be full of danger to the government and to the

republic.

"The government employees of France resorted to it and took the

government by the throat. The executive was entirely dependent upon

these employees for its continuance.

"When those in executive authority refused to acquiesce in the

demands, the government employees struck, and then with the

helplessness of the government and the destruction of all authority

and the choking of government activities it was seen that to allow

government employees the use of such an instrument was to recognize

revolution as a lawful means of securing an increase in

compensation for one class, and that a _privileged class_, at the

expense of all the public....

"The government employees are a privileged class whose work is

necessary to carry on the government and upon whose entry into the

government service it is entirely reasonable to impose conditions

that should not be and ought not to be imposed upon those who serve

private employers."

Here the Socialists join issue squarely with the almost universally

prevalent non-Socialist opinion. They do not consider government

employment a "privilege" nor any strike whatever as "mutiny," "treason,"

or "rebellion." Socialists believe that the only possible means of

maintaining democracy at all in this age when government employees are

beginning to increase in numbers more rapidly than those of private

industry, is that they should be allowed to maintain their right to

organize _and to strike_--no matter how great difficulties it may

involve. To decide the question as President Butler wishes, or as

President Taft implies it should be decided, Socialists believe, would

mean to turn every government into a military organization. The time is

not far distant when in all the leading nations a very large part and in

some cases a majority of the population will be in government

employment. If even the present limited rights of organization are done

away with, and the military laws of subordination are applied,

Socialists ask, shall we not have exactly that military and autocratic

bureaucracy, that "State Socialism" which Spencer so rightly feared? The

fact that these perfectly legal and necessary strikes may some day lead

to revolution is capitalism's misfortune, which society will not permit

it to cure by turning the clock back to absolutism. The question of the

organization of government employees, one of the most important to-day,

will, as President Butler says, be the crucial question of the near

future.

It is in France that the question has come to the first test, not

because the French bureaucracy is more numerous than that of Prussia and

some other Continental countries, but because of the powerful democratic

and Socialist tendency that has grown up along with this bureaucracy and

is now directed against it. Especially interesting is the fact that

Briand, who not long ago advocated the Socialist general strike and

certainly realized its danger to present government as well as its

possibilities for Socialism, has, as Premier, evolved measures of

repression against organizations of State employees more stringent than

have been introduced in any country making the slightest pretension to

democratic or semi-democratic government.

The world first became aware of the importance of this issue at the time

of the organization and the strike of the French telegraphers and post

office employees in the early part of 1909, and again in the railway

strike in 1910. As early as 1906 the organized postal employees had been

definitely refused the right to strike, and it became manifest that if

they attempted to use this weapon to correct the very serious grievances

under which they suffered, it would be looked upon as "a kind of treason

against the State." At the end of 1908, however, after having discussed

the matter for many years, a congress of all the employees of the State

was held. More than twenty different associations participated and

decided unanimously to claim the full rights of other labor

organizations. Finally, when these organizations appealed to the

General Federation of Labor to help them, there came the strike of 1909.

Unfortunately for the postmen, the French railway and miners' unions

were at the moment still in relatively conservative hands, and the

majority of their members were as yet by no means anxious to aid in the

general strike movement. After a brilliant success in their first

effort, a second strike a few weeks later proved a total failure.

The government then began to make it clear that public employees were to

be allowed no right to strike, and Jaurès pointed out that it was trying

to carry this new repressive legislation by accompanying it by new

pension laws and other concessions to the State employees,--a repetition

of the old policy of more bread and less power, which is likely to play

a more and more important rôle every year as we enter into the State

capitalistic period.

The character of the organizations allowed for government employees,

under the new laws, would remind one of Prussia or Russia rather than

France. While certain forms of association are permitted, the right to

strike is precluded, and the various associations of government

employees are forbidden either to form any kind of federation or to

unite with other unions outside of government employments. "Councils of

discipline are created where the employees are represented," but "in the

case of a collected or concerted cessation of work all disciplinary

penalties may be inflicted without the intervention of the councils of

discipline; courts may order the dissolution of any union at the request

of the ministry," which means that at any moment a police war may be

instituted against these organizations, in the true Russian style.

The reply of the postmen's organization to this kind of legislation is,

that the administration of the post office is an industrial and

commercial administration; that it is a vast enterprise of general

utility; that the notion of loyalty or treason is entirely misplaced in

this field. They have declared that the new legislation is wrong

"because it perpetuates the bureaucratic tradition; because with a

contempt for all the necessities of modern life it discountenances

organization of labor; because it has constituted a repressive legal

condition for wage earners; and because it is an act of authority which

has nothing in common with free contract."

Here we see the public employees, supported by the Socialists,

insisting on industrial and commercial considerations, on the rights of

individuals and on free contract, as against the capitalists and

governing classes, who claim to defend these very principles from

supposed Socialist attacks, but abandon them the moment they threaten

capitalist profits and capitalist rule. This attitude of the French

Socialist shows the very heart of the Socialist situation. In fact, it

is only as private capitalism becomes State capitalism, or "State

Socialism," that Socialists will be able to show what their position

really is. It is only then that the coercive aspect of capitalism, which

is now partly latent and partly obscured by certain functions that it

has still to fill in the development of society, will become visible to

all eyes.

The French railroad strike of October, 1910, brought the question of

organizations of government employees still more into international

prominence. Until the recent British upheaval it was, perhaps, the

greatest and most menacing strike in modern history. It is true that its

apparent object was only a few just, and relatively insignificant

economic concessions--which were granted for the most part immediately

after the struggle. But behind these, as every one realized, lay the

question of the right of government employees to organize and to strike

and the determination of the French Socialists and labor unionists to

use the opportunity to take a step towards the "general strike."

Never has the issue between capitalism and Socialism been more sharply

defined than in Premier Briand's impulsively frank declaration after the

strike (though it was later retracted): "I say emphatically, if the laws

have not given the government the means of keeping the country master of

its railways and the national defense, it would not have hesitated to

take recourse to illegality."

This is almost the exact declaration of Ex-President Roosevelt in his

Decoration Day speech in 1911, when he said that really revolutionary

men dreaded and hated him because they knew that _he wouldn't let the

Constitution stand in the way of punishing them if they did wrong_.

Milder but no less positive expressions of an intention to use illegal

means to coerce labor, if it does not act as present authorities

dictate, were to be heard from responsible sources both in England and

America after the recent British railway strike. The non-Socialist press

then came almost unanimously to the conclusion that an attempt must be

made to take away the sole weapon by which labor is able to protect

itself or advance its position as soon as "the public" is damaged by its

use--which amounts to reducing wage earners to the status of children,

soldiers, or other wards of the community. "If railroad and telegraph

strikes are many and violent," said _Collier's Weekly_, "they will

encourage government ownership without unionization."[274]

The _Outlook_ stopped short of government ownership, but announced a

similar principle: "The railways are public highways; they must be

controlled by the nation for the public good; the operation of the

railways must not be stopped because of disputes; and, as a corollary to

this last law of necessity, the government must furnish an adequate and

just method of settling railway disputes."[275] Every step in government

control is to be accompanied by a step in the control of labor, and

restriction of the power of labor unions. The right of employees to

protect themselves by leaving their work in a body is to be taken away

completely, while the right to discharge or punish is to remain intact

in persons over whom the employees can have little or no control.

Governments are evidently ready to proceed to illegality for the sake of

self-preservation--even from a perfectly legal attack, if it threatens

to destroy them or to transfer the government into the hands of the

non-capitalist classes. Of course a capitalist government can pass

"laws," _e.g._ martial law, under which anything it chooses to do

against its opponents becomes "legal" and anything effective its

opponents do becomes illegal. In the present age of general

enlightenment, however, this method does not even deceive Russian

peasants. But the French government is now turning to this device.

Briand explained away his sensational declaration above quoted, and then

proposed a law by which striking on a railway becomes a crime and almost

a felony. This met universal approval in the capitalistic press and

universal denunciation in that of the Socialists and labor unions. The

_Boston Herald_, for example, said: "The Executive must be armed with

greater authority than he now possesses. No Premier must be forced to

say, as M. Briand did recently, that, with or without law, national

supremacy will be preserved in case it is challenged by allied workers

for the State, as well as by other toilers." Here there is no effort to

disguise the fact that the new legal form is the _exact equivalent_ of

the illegal force formerly proposed.

Now the peasants and the lower middle classes of France, as well as the

working people (land and opportunities being more and more difficult to

obtain), are becoming extremely radical. Though they do not send

Socialist deputies to the Chamber, they send representatives who are

very suspicious of arbitrary, undemocratic, and centralized authority.

Only 215 members of the Chamber could be induced to approve of the

government's conduct during the strike of 1910, while more than 200

abstained from voting on this point, and 166 voted in the negative. The

proposed measures of repression were carried by a small majority, but it

is not likely that they can be enforced many years without bringing

about another and far more revolutionary crisis. Briand and his

associates, Millerand and Viviani, were forced to resign, partly on

account of their conduct in this strike, and it is possible that after

another election or two the Chamber will no longer give its consent to

this relegation of workingmen to the status of common soldiers. Only six

months after the strike, Briand's successor, Monis, with the consent of

the Chamber, was bringing governmental pressure to bear on the privately

owned railways to force them to take back dismissed strikers. In the

next ministry, that of Caillaux, the Minister of Labor, Augagneur, the

former Socialist, pursued the same policy of pressing for the

reinstatement of a large part of the discharged employees of the private

railroads while insisting that the employees of government railroads

could not be allowed to strike. And again, at the end of 1911, the

government secured only 286 votes in favor of this policy, to 193

against it.[276]

France is by no means the only country where the question of strikes of

government employees has become all-important. When the railways were

nationalized in Italy there was considerable Socialist opposition on the

ground that the employees were likely to lose a part of such rights as

they had had when in private employment, and it turned out just as was

feared. The position of the Italian Socialists on the subject is as

interesting as that of the French. The Congress at Florence in 1908

resolved that "considering the fact that a strike of municipalized or

nationalized services represents, not the struggle of the proletariat

against a private capitalistic enterprise, but the conflict of a class

against the collectivity, whence the difficulty of its success, the

employees in public service ought to be advised not to proclaim a strike

unless urged on by the most compelling motives and when every other

means have failed;" but "taking it into consideration at the same time

that in the present condition of society the working people in public

service have no other means to guarantee the defense of their rights,

and that in critical moments of history the suspension of public

services is among the most efficacious arms of which the proletariat can

avail itself to disorganize the defense of the government, any

disposition to bring into legislation the principle of the abolition of

the right to strike is dangerous" and "any attempt in that direction"

must be defeated.

The gulf between those who consider the collective refusal of the

organizations of government employees to work under conditions they do

not accept, as being "treason" and "mutiny," and those who feel that

such an organization is the _very basis_ of industrial democracy of the

future and the sole possible guarantee of liberty, is surely

unbridgeable.

The clash between the classes on this question of livelihood and liberty

is already momentous, but its full significance can only be realized

when the Socialist aim is recalled. As employees of railroads, of

governments, and of industries become Socialists, they will not only be

ready to strike to raise their wages, or to protect the unions and the

Socialist Party, or to prevent military reaction, but also--when they

have the majority with them--to take possession of government.

An editorial in the _New York Call_ (October 31, 1911) shows how most

American Socialists expect the general strike to work:--

"The failure of one 'general' strike, or any attempt to carry out a

general strike, does not bankrupt or destroy the working class, for

the reason that it is that class which holds the future in its

hands. Nor does such failure help capitalism--the decaying

system--in any way. On the contrary, it helps disintegrate it, and

the failure itself is merely the necessary prelude to a still

stronger assault by the same method. The general strike seems to be

like what is said of democracy, that the cure for democracy is

still more democracy. In the same way the cure for the general

strike is to make it still more 'general' in character. The less

'general' it is, the less chance has it of success, and the more

'general' it can be made, the more certain is it of success.

"And that success may not, and very likely will not, take the form

hoped for by those who advocate it as a means of immediate or even

ultimate social revolution. But even this, if true, is no argument

against its use. It will, however, bring the social revolution

nearer in other ways.

"We hardly, for instance, expect to see the capitalists, paralyzed

by the most 'general' of general strikes surrender their property

offhand to the victorious proletariat in despair of being able to

operate it themselves. Much as we would like to see the working

class march in and take possession of the abandoned factories and

workshops in this manner, and commence operations under their

collective ownership, the vision can only remain while other

factors are disregarded. There is possibly much more flexibility

and elasticity in the capitalist system than is usually imagined by

Socialists. As William Morris tells old John Ball, the 'rascal

hedge-priest,' 'Mastership hath many shifts' before it finally goes

down and out.

"If we were to venture an opinion, the course and procedure of the

general strike, with special reference to the railroads and allied

industries, will follow something in this order.

"General strikes will succeed one another intermittently, each

becoming more 'general,' the method finally establishing itself as

a settled policy of the workers in enforcing their demands. Some

may fail, but from time to time they will grow more 'general' and

more powerful, and will wrest more concessions from the owners,

until the point is reached where the railroad business will return

practically no private profits to its owners. And when this point

is reached, or the certainty of its being reached is plainly seen,

then mastership will make its next shift. There will be two

alternatives.

"The first is literal, physical suppression, by the armed forces of

the nation still under control of the capitalists, and greatly

augmented for the purpose. This, however, for a multitude of

reasons, is a most dangerous policy and much more 'impossible' than

the general strike. Instead of postponing social revolution, it

rather accelerates its approach.

"The other alternative, and the one by all means most likely to be

adopted, is government ownership of the railroads, with the

capitalists, of course, as owners of the government. This will

undoubtedly be ushered in as 'State Socialism.' Laws will be passed

constituting the railroad workers as direct servants of the State,

and forbidding the general strike or any other kind of strike.

"The prohibition will not have the desired effect. If attempted to

be enforced, it merely throws capitalist society back on the first

dangerous alternative policy we have mentioned. But it will give

capitalism a breathing spell, and a chance to 'spar for wind' for a

while, which is the best it can expect. The general strike will

still be utilized to assail the capitalist State and its property.

"The final struggle will be a political one, for the capture of the

State from the hands of the capitalists, and such capture will mean

the transfer of capitalist State-owned property to collective

property and the establishment of industrial democracy, or

Socialism."

FOOTNOTES:

[271] The following quotations are taken from the brochure, "Der

Generalstreik," by Henriette Roland-Holst (Dresden, 1905).

[272] From a private letter published editorially in the _New York Sun_.

[273] The _Outlook_, Nov. 25, 1911.

[274] _Collier's Weekly_, Sept. 2, 1911.

[275] The _Outlook_, Aug. 26, 1911.

[276] _Die Neue Zeit_, Oct. 27, 1911.

CHAPTER VII

REVOLUTION IN DEFENSE OF CIVIL GOVERNMENT

"The workers do not yet understand," says Debs, "that they are engaged

in a class struggle, and must unite their class and get on the right

side of that struggle economically, politically, and in every other

way--strike together, vote together, and, if necessary, fight

together."[277] Socialists are prepared to use force when governments

resort to arbitrary violence--for example, to martial "law." In the

Socialist view no occasion whatever justifies the suspension of the

regular government the people has instituted--and even if such an

occasion could arise there is no authority to which they would consent

to give arbitrary power. Military "government" is not government, but

organized violence.

Tolstoi's masterly language on this matter will scarcely be improved

upon:--

"The slavery of the working people is due to this, that there are

governments. But if the slavery of the laborers is due to the

government, the emancipation is naturally conditioned by the

abolition of the existing governments and the establishment of new

governments,--such as will make possible the liberation of the land

from ownership, the abolition of taxes, and the transference of the

capital and the factories into the power and control of the working

people.

"There are men who recognize this issue as possible, and who are

preparing themselves for it.... So long as the soldiers are in the

hands of the government, which lives on taxes and is connected with

the owners of land and of capital, a revolution is impossible. And

so long as the soldiers are in the hands of the government, the

structure of life will be such as those who have the soldiers in

their hands want it to be.

"The governments, who are already in possession of a disciplined

force, will never permit the formation of another disciplined

force. All the attempts of the past century have shown how vain

such attempts are. Nor is there a way out, as the Socialists

believe, by means of forming a great economic force which would be

able to fight successfully against the consolidated and ever more

consolidating force of the capitalists. Never will the labor

unions, who may be in possession of a few miserable millions, be

able to fight against the economic power of the multimillionaires,

who are always supported by the military force. Just as little is

there a way out as is proposed by other Socialists, by getting

possession of the majority of the Parliament. Such a majority in

the Parliament will not attain anything, so long as the army is in

the hands of the governments. The moment the decrees of the

Parliament are opposed to the interests of the ruling classes, the

government will close and disperse such a parliament, as has been

so frequently done and as will be done so long as the army is in

the hands of the government."

Tolstoi, in spite of his contrary impression, here reaches conclusions

which are the same as those of the Socialists; for they are well aware

that armies are likely to be used to dissolve Parliaments and labor

unions.

"The introduction of socialistic principles into the army will not

accomplish anything," Tolstoi continues. "The hypnotism of the army

is so artfully applied that the most free-thinking and rational

person will, _so long as he is in the army_, always do what is

demanded of him. Thus there is no way out by means of revolution or

in Socialism."

Here Tolstoi is again mistaken, for at this point also Socialists agree

with him completely. The soldier, they agree, must be reached, and some

think must even be led to act, _before_ he reaches the barracks--whether

he is about to enter them for military training in times of peace or for

service in times of war.

"If there is a way out," concludes Tolstoi, "it is the one which

has not been used yet, and which alone incontestably destroys the

whole consolidated, artful, and long-established governmental

machine for the enslavement of the masses. This way out consists in

refusing to enter into the army, before one is subjected to the

stupefying and corrupting influence of discipline.

"This way out is the only one which is possible and which at the

same time is inevitably obligatory for every individual

person."[278]

Socialists differ from the great Russian, not in their analysis of the

situation, but in their more practical remedy. They would _organize_ the

campaign against military service instead of leaving it to the

individual, and _after_ they had converted a sufficient majority to

their views they would not hesitate to use any kind of force that seemed

necessary to put an end to government by force. But they would not

proceed to such lengths until their political and economic modes of

action were forcefully prevented from further development. If civil

government is suspended to combat the great general strike towards which

Socialists believe society is moving they will undertake to restore it

or to set up a new one to replace that which the authorities have

"legally" destroyed. I say _legally_ because all capitalist governments

have provided for this contingency by giving their executives the right

to suspend government when they please--on the pretext that its

existence is threatened by internal disorder. It has been generally and

publicly agreed among capitalist authorities that this power shall be

used in the case of a general strike--as the British government

declared, at the time of the recent railway strike, _whether there is

extensive popular violence or not_.

I have shown that the Socialists contemplate the use of the general

strike whenever, in vital matters, governments refuse to bow to the

clearly expressed will of the majority, and that they recognize the

difficulties to be overcome before such a measure can be used

successfully. Of course the overwhelming majority of the population will

have to be against the government. But the military aspect of the

question may possibly make it necessary that the majority to be secured

will have to be even greater than was at first contemplated, and that an

even more intense struggle will have to be carried on. The Bismarcks of

the world are already using armies as strike breakers and training them

especially for this purpose, while even the more democratic and peaceful

States, like England and France, are rapidly following in the same

direction. Of course, as Bismarck said, not all of a large army can be

so used, but there is a strong tendency in Russia and Germany, which may

be imitated elsewhere, for the military leaders to concentrate their

efforts and attention on the picked and more or less professional part

of their armies, and it is this part that is being used for

strike-breaking purposes.

No one has dealt more ably with this struggle between the working people

and coercive government than Karl Liebknecht, recently elected to the

Reichstag from the Kaiser's own district of Potsdam, who spent a year as

a political prisoner in Germany for his "Militarismus und

Anti-Militarismus." Liebknecht opens his pamphlet by quoting a statement

of Bismarck to Professor Dr. Otto Kamaell, in October, 1892:--

"In Rome water and fire were forbidden to him who put himself

outside of the legal order. In the middle ages that was called to

outlaw. It was necessary to treat the Social-Democracy in the same

way, to take away its political rights and its right to vote. So

far I have gone. The Social-Democratic question is a military

question. The Social-Democracy is being handled now in an

extraordinarily superficial way. The Social-Democracy is striving

now--and with success--to win the noncommissioned officers. In

Hamburg already a good part of the troops consist of

Social-Democrats, since the people there have the right to enter

exclusively into their own battalion. What now if these troops

should refuse to shoot their fathers and brothers as the Kaiser has

demanded? Shall we send the regiments of Hanover and Mecklenburg

against Hamburg? Then we have something there like the Commune in

Paris. The Kaiser was frightened. He said to me he wouldn't exactly

care about being called a cardboard prince like his grandfather,

nor at the very beginning of his reign to wade up to the knees in

blood. Then I said to him, 'Your Majesty will have to go deeper if

you give way now.'"

Here we have it from the lips of Bismarck that the Social-Democratic

question was already a military question in his time, and his view is

supported by the present Kaiser. This is high authority. Similar views

and threats have been common among the statesmen of our time in nearly

every country.

As early as 1903 the government of Holland broke a large general strike

by the use of the army to operate the railroads, and the same thing was

done in Hungary in the following year. Indeed, these measures had such a

great success that the Hungarian government went farther two years

later, and took away the right of organization from the agricultural

laborers; while at the same time it used the army as strike breakers in

harvest time and made permanent arrangements for doing this in a similar

contingency in the future. In the matter of breaking railway strikes by

soldiers, Bulgaria and other countries are following Holland and

Hungary. The latest and most extraordinary example is undoubtedly the

use of soldiers by the "Socialist" Briand to break the recent railroad

strike in democratic France.[279]