The Chancellor’s new proposals for getting rid of the great deficit
have been received on all sides in Berlin with mockery and derision. To
what lengths this dissatisfaction may yet go there is no foretelling.
For a long time past there has been a great spirit of discontent
amongst the artificers in metals, and more particularly amongst
engineers. These men claim to have had a large share in bringing about
the Revolution, and they complain that they are now shamefully cheated
out of what Socialism had always promised them. It certainly cannot
be denied that before the great Revolution they had over and over
again been promised the _full reward of their labours_. This, as they
maintain, had expressly and repeatedly appeared in black and white in
the columns of the _Onward_. And shall they now put up with it, that
they only receive the same wages as all the others?
They say that if they were to receive the full value of the machines
and tools which are turned out of their shops, after deducting the cost
of raw material and auxiliary material, they would get, at least, four
times as much as they do now.
It is in vain that the _Onward_ has endeavoured to point out to them
that their interpretation is an entirely false one. Socialism, says
this organ, never contemplated giving to each labourer in his special
field the full reward of his work in that particular sphere of labour.
It promised the nation as a whole the full reward of the labours
effected by the whole people. Whatever these mechanics might turn out
of their shops and mills, it was quite clear that the things turned
out were not the result purely and simply of hand labour. Expensive
machines and tools were equally necessary to their production. In a no
less degree were large buildings and considerable means indispensable.
All these accessories had not been produced by the workmen actually
engaged at the time being. Seeing then that the Community finds all
these buildings, plans, and means, it was assuredly only just that the
Community should appropriate whatever remained after paying a certain
wage calculated at one uniform rate for all persons in the country.
But these mechanics, somehow, cannot be brought to view the thing in
this light. They say that if the State, or the Community, or whatever
you like to call it, is now to take those profits which formerly were
paid to shareholders for the loan of their capital, it comes to much
the same thing to them in the long run. If this was to be the end of
the affair, the great Revolution might just as well never have taken
place at all.
The prospect of the lengthening of the working-day to twelve hours
has made these workmen in the different metal trades more bitter than
ever. Twelve hours a day at a roaring fire, and at work on hard metals,
is a different thing from twelve hours behind a counter waiting for
customers, or twelve hours looking after children.
In short, these men demand the full reward of their labour as they
understand the term, the working-day being limited to ten hours at the
very outside. Several large meetings of the men have already taken
place at night on Jungfern Common and Wuhl Common, to debate upon the
question of a resort to force should their demands not be conceded.
There is talk of the threatened strike embracing 40,000 men, who are
engaged in Berlin in the different metal branches.