THE ATTITUDE OF THE SOCIALISTS TOWARDS THE TWO PARLIAMENTARY PARTIES
From the Socialist point of view there is for all practical purposes
no difference between the two great parties. Both are representative,
not of the people, but of capitalism. Both are hostile to labour.
"The difference between Liberalism and Toryism is merely a question of
phraseology; there is no fundamental clashing of principle. Both stand
for the private ownership of the means of life. They both support a
competitive state of society with its inevitable exploitation of the
wealth-producers."[618] "Both the Conservative and Liberal parties are
agreed in supporting private ownership in the instruments of
production for the purposes of profit-making. Their differences are
merely superficial and their programmes admittedly offer no solution
of the problems of poverty. The Independent Labour Party regards them
both as equally the enemies of labour, and in fact merely as two
sections of the entrenched forces of plutocracy."[619] "There are not
really two parties in the State. There is but one great party, that of
privilege, divided into two factions, labelled Whig and Tory, or
Liberal and Conservative. Both do much the same things in office. The
mimic warfare which they wage with each other, no shrewd observer
takes seriously. It is merely a pleasant game of which the stakes are
the spoils of office and patronage. An 'organised hypocrisy' is but a
mild description of an English Government, whether Liberal or
Conservative. The Liberal and the Conservative are the two thieves
between whom the people are evermore crucified."[620] "Neither of the
political parties is of any use to the workers, because both the
political parties are paid, officered, and led by capitalists whose
interests are opposed to the interests of the workers. The Socialist
laughs at the pretended friendship of Liberal and Tory leaders for the
workers."[621] "There's no difference whatever between Bannerman, the
Scottish landowner, and Balfour, whose uncle made _200,000l._ out of
army contracts in India in four years. These people are entirely
antagonistic to the worker."[622]
The assertions of the Liberals that they are the true friends of the
people, that they have always fought for liberty and democracy, that
they have given the vote to the people, and that they trust the
people, are treated with derision and contempt. "Liberalism has
historically opposed itself alike to Toryism, landed interest, and
democracy, working-class interest whenever that interest appeared as a
distinct political party."[623] "Since 1832 the Liberals had eight
opportunities to give justice to the voteless multitude. In every
election from 1832 to 1865 solemn pledges were made by the Liberals
that a Reform Bill should be introduced as soon as they were elected,
and each time these pledges were ignored after they had secured power
and position."[624] As regards the giving of the franchise, the
Conservatives have not been much better than the Liberals. "Neither
party can claim much credit for its Reform Bills, extorted as they
have been, not by belief in democracy, but by fear of the opposing
faction. Even now the citizen is tricked out of his vote by every
possible legal and administrative technicality; so that more than
one-third of our adult men are unenfranchised, together with the whole
of the other sex. Neither the Conservative party nor the self-styled
'Party of the Masses,' gives proof of any real desire to give the vote
to this not inconsiderable remnant; but both sides pay lip-homage to
democracy."[625]
Socialists say that the claims of the Liberals to the gratitude of the
masses are hypocritical. Their policy has not been based on
philanthropy, but on a sordid selfishness. They attacked the landed
interest not in order to benefit the people, but in order to make
themselves supreme in the State and to fill their own purses.
Liberalism, with talk of liberty of the individual and of freedom of
trade on its lips, is in reality the representative of capitalism of
the most heartless kind. "The political power of the landed classes
was to be broken; the capitalists were to be allowed to do as they
liked with their own; a state of individualism was to be established;
it was to be a fair field for all and devil take the hindmost. So far
as politics and the law are concerned, this ideal of Liberalism has
been realised. Land is no longer supreme. Money ranks with it.
Everyone has a chance of obtaining money. _Ergo_, we are a democratic
nation."[626] "With the change in economic conditions, with the growth
of manufacture, the rise of the bourgeoisie meant the downfall of
feudalism. The plutocrat supplanted the baron, capitalism became king.
The 'old nobility' of England to-day are successful brewers, bankers,
and traders, and the Nonconformist Conscience dominates in the place
of Holy Mother Church."[627] "The representatives of this class in
Parliament repealed the Corn Laws, securing cheap bread for their
workers at the expense of the landlords and the farmers. The new
masters opposed the Factory Acts, championed by Tories such as Lord
Ashley, Thomas Sadler, and 'King Richard' Oastler, They fostered
railway development, at the public expense, so that they might have
quick and cheap transit for their manufactures."[628]
The Liberals have shown their selfishness, heartlessness, and greed by
opposing the greatest boon to workers, the Factory Acts. "Was it the
Liberal party which initiated the Factory Acts, which were certainly
the greatest step towards the elevation of the working class that was
ever taken in the course of the last century? Oh, no! So far from the
Liberal party initiating the Factory Acts, we know perfectly well that
the Liberal party--leading members of the Liberal party, like Mr. John
Bright and Mr. Richard Cobden--fiercely and bitterly opposed the
Factory Acts. We know that no one fought more strenuously against the
ten-hour day than Mr. John Bright. We know that all these canting
Liberal hypocrites--I can call them nothing else--said with regard to
the ten-hour day, just what they say now about the proposal for an
eight-hour day--one of the proposals we put forward in order to get
rid of this hideous difficulty of the unemployed. The argument was put
forward then, that the restriction of the hours of labour would ruin
our industries. Precisely the same argument was put forward when it
was proposed to put a stop to the terrible over-work of the children
deep down in the bowels of the earth. Women and children were
mercilessly driven by brutal overseers at their task, and this was
maintained by your Liberal party in order that they might obtain large
profits out of their white slaves. Only let the Liberal party appeal
to history in its claim for working-class support, and then the
working class will arrive at the conclusion to which many of us have
already come--that the Liberal party, so far from being entitled to
our support, is entitled to our greatest loathing and hatred."[629]
"As to the Factory Acts, it was not a question of Messrs. Bright and
Cobden alone, but of the whole organised body of the Liberal party,
which opposed the Factory Acts, and they were only carried by the
hostility of the Tory party to the Liberals for having dared to
interfere with the Corn Laws. The Factory Acts were passed in
retaliation by the landlord party against the capitalist party."[630]
"Mr. Gladstone was the only member who endeavoured to delay the Bill
which delivered women and children from mines and pits; and never did
he say a word on behalf of the factory children until, when defending
slavery in the West Indies, he taunted Buxton with indifference to the
slavery in England."[631] "If I were to draw a comparison between the
Liberal and the Tory parties, I should say that the Tory party has
done more in that direction than the Liberal party has done."[632] Mr.
Blatchford wrote in the "Clarion" that "the Liberal party has never
helped the trade unions," and proved this assertion by giving a
detailed statement of the trade union legislation, which showed that
modern trade unionism was constantly opposed by the Liberals and was
created by the Conservatives.[633]
In consequence of its record, Socialists see in Liberalism not a friend,
but an enemy. "Liberalism stands for individualism, and the Liberal
capitalist and trader are bitterly opposed to the trade union and
co-operative society. They found that these bodies, however, were
beginning to exercise an important, if indirect, influence upon their
party. Liberal leaders, alive to the importance of vote-catching, began
to angle for the support of the working-class organisations."[634] "We
have no reason for supporting the Liberal party any more than the Tory
party. Men do not gather grapes from thorns, nor figs from thistles. The
Liberal party is to-day what it has always been--an organisation of
capitalists formed to serve the interests of the capitalist class."[635]
Liberalism, with its championship of exaggerated individualism, stands
not for liberty, but for administrative anarchy. "The trouble with
nineteenth century Liberalism is that, by instinct, by tradition, and
by the positive precepts of its past exponents, it 'thinks in
individuals.' It visualises the world as a world of independent
Roundheads, with separate ends, and abstract rights to pursue those
ends. Nineteenth century Liberalism is, in fact, axiomatically hostile
to the State. It is not 'little Englandism' that is the matter with
those who still cling to such views; it is, as Huxley and Matthew
Arnold correctly diagnosed, administrative Nihilism. So far as
political action is concerned, they tend to be inveterately negative.
They have hung up temperance reform and educational reform for a
quarter of a century, because, instead of seeking to enable the
citizen to refresh himself without being poisoned or inebriated and to
get the children thoroughly taught, they have wanted primarily to
revenge their outraged temperance principles on the publican and their
outraged Nonconformist principles on the Church. Of such Liberals it
may be said that the destructive revolutionary tradition is in their
bones; they will reform nothing unless it can be done at the expense
of their enemies."[636]
"The question is frequently put: 'Why are Socialists so much opposed
to Liberalism?' But a little serious reflection will explain the
circumstance. Liberalism is really more conservative than Toryism.
This is not a paradox, it is a fact. Toryism stands for government,
and it does not necessarily follow that it stands for bad government.
Liberalism, on the other hand, admittedly seeks an unrestrained
operation of the individual will. It is opposed to government. It does
not consciously subscribe to the recognition of our social being. It
regards individuals as self-contained units operating in separate
spheres. The less government we have the better, is the keynote of
Liberalism. This was Emerson's theory, and Emerson was an
anarchist."[637] "The modern Conservative candidate is politically a
man without prejudices. No abstract principle forbids him to listen
sympathetically to any proposal for reform. Hence he seems on the
platform less belated than the nineteenth century Liberal with his
stock of shop-soiled principles at full price."[638] "In many people's
minds the terms 'Liberalism' and 'insincerity' are held to be
synonymous. Lacking a central idea of its own, and necessarily failing
to nourish on borrowed ones, there is nothing before the Liberal party
but decay. For progress in the future we must look to a party which
has an ideal and is prepared to stand by it."[639]
Before the general election of 1906 Socialists wrote: "The political
force of Liberalism is spent. During the last twenty years its
aspirations and its watchwords, its ideas of daily life, and its
conceptions of the universe, have become increasingly distasteful to
the ordinary citizen as he renews his youth from generation to
generation. Its worship of individual liberty evokes no enthusiasm.
Its reliance on 'freedom of contract' and 'supply and demand,' with
its corresponding 'voluntaryism' in religion and philanthropy, now
seems to work out disastrously for the masses who are too poor to have
what the economists call an 'effective demand' for even the minimum
conditions of physical and mental health necessary to national
well-being."[640] "For the last twenty years the Liberal party has
been trying to fit itself with a new programme. It took up Home Rule
for Ireland, but found that split the party; it took up temperance
reform, quite a deviation from its old policy of individual liberty,
and again found itself divided; it avowed friendliness to Labour, and
frightened off still another batch of supporters. The Party of
Progress finds itself now in the unhappy position that its basic idea
is old-fashioned, and when it tries to assimilate a new one it becomes
a case of putting new wine into old bottles. That is the sad plight of
the Liberal party. The party is merely living from hand to mouth as an
anti-Tory party, hoping to profit by the mistakes of its rival. The
party has split up on temperance, on labour, on the war, on
Imperialism, on education, simply because there is no central
vivifying ideal to bind together and shape the policy. Can the party
adopt a new ideal? is the great question. Can it drop its fundamental
idea of individualism and take up the idea of co-operation? and the
answer is emphatically 'No.'"[641]
The philosopher of British Socialism thinks that, owing to the
principles and attitude of the Liberal party, Liberalism and Socialism
are deadly enemies. "Liberalism, in so far as it aims at maintaining
the liberty of private property, is reactionary and false to the
principle which it has always implicitly or explicitly maintained, of
the right of each and every individual to a full and free development.
In so far as Liberalism does this, in so far as it assumes as
axiomatic a state of society based on unrestricted freedom of private
property, and proceeds to adjust social arrangements solely or
primarily in the interests of the owners of private property, in so
far Liberalism and Socialism are death enemies."[642] The leading
Fabian organ stated: "A party subsisting on illusions, concealments,
and hypocrisies, could hardly survive in the atmosphere engendered by
a real fight like that between plutocracy and Socialism. For some time
it may contrive to subsist by telling the electorate that the only
true way of resisting Socialism is by means of Liberal reforms, while
at the same time (with doubtful consistency) asking for Socialist
support on the ground that it goes 'part of the way.' But its best
chance is probably to divert public attention from Socialism to other
matters, and this the Prime Minister evidently feels. The existence of
the Liberal party is incompatible with the existence of intellectual
honesty in its leaders. And with all his faults Sir Henry is too
fundamentally honest a man to lead it effectively at the present
juncture. The reins had better be handed over to Mr. Winston
Churchill, against whom no such objection can be urged."[643]
Before the Liberals set to work in 1906, Mr. Philip Snowden wrote: "It
might be said that in the next Parliament the Liberal party is on its
last trial."[644] That trial has had, as far as the Socialists and the
Labour party are concerned, an unsatisfactory result. Before the
general election Socialists asked themselves: "Will the Liberal party
come into power with a clear mandate for reform which even the House
of Lords will not dare entirely to obstruct, or will it shuffle into
power on the misdoings of its predecessors and carry out a halfhearted
policy in the hope of not estranging any of its moderate followers? If
it takes the latter course, it will win the undying contempt of all
real reformers; it will be the last time that a Liberal Administration
holds sway, and Labour will be left the only really progressive force
in the country."[645] Twelve months later, in a review of the activity
of the Liberal Government, "The Reformers' Year Book" stated: "The
story of Chinese labour in the Transvaal during the year 1906 has been
one of continuous perfidy on the part of the Liberal Government at
home. Returned to power largely on account of the opposition of the
people of this country to Chinese slavery in any shape or form, they
have burked the main issue at every point, and only carried out a few
minor changes which have been totally ineffective, retaining all the
while a hypocritical devotion to the popular ideal."[646] "The Liberal
Government has failed entirely to justify the confidence reposed in it
by the electorate, not only upon the newer questions as they have
arisen--such as the war in Natal--but on the very matters upon which
it was returned to power, of which the chief was the continuance of
Chinese labour in the Transvaal."[647]
Socialists think that the Liberal agitation against the House of Lords
is insincere and hypocritical. "Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's brave
talk about fighting the House of Lords sounds very much like blarney
when we call to mind the fact that he has beaten all records in the
creation of peers. He has not yet been two years in office, but he has
managed to make no less than twenty new peers. They include a tobacco
man, a whisky man, a newspaper man who sold his journal to the Tories,
several usurers and company promoters."[648]
The assurance of the Liberals that they are the friends of Labour is
doubted in view of the attitude of the party towards Labour
candidates. "Liberals are continually saying that there is no quarrel
between Liberalism and Labour. Why, then, do we have the constantly
recurring spectacle of a middle-class Liberal being run against a
popular and capable man who can claim to directly represent the people
who live by the work of their hands and heads as distinguished from
those who live upon rent, dividends, or interest? Are there not even
upon the Liberal side plenty of landlords, railway directors, bankers,
stockbrokers, and employers of labour, that a seat cannot be spared to
a workman till he wins it in despite of Liberal and Tory opposition
alike?"[649]
An amalgamation of the Liberals and the Socialist-Labour members is
impossible. "Liberal-Labourism" is a delusion. "Labour men and
capitalist Liberals are beginning to see that individualism and
co-operation will not mix. If Liberalism to-day swallows Labourism, it
will have a severe attack of indigestion. Mr. Keir Hardie in the
Liberal ranks would do more to disrupt and destroy the Liberal party
than he can possibly do from the outside. Labour, it is true, might
capture the Liberal party, and this is advocated by some, but if this
took place the party would wither away. The capitalist element would
drop out and Labour would be left alone. Labour might just as well
build up a new party outside. It is no use capturing a weapon which
crumbles to pieces as soon as you grasp it. Better make a new
weapon."[650] "The Labour party in the House of Commons is as yet not
disliked only because as yet it is not feared. Until it has made
itself both disliked and feared, it will be far short of having
fulfilled the objects of its very existence. It is not saying too much
to say that in the very near future the measure of the Labour party's
effectiveness will be its unpopularity in the House of Commons.
Acrimonious as are the feelings often evoked by political
controversies, they are urbanity itself as compared with the passions
aroused over economic issues. The limits of Liberal concession must
needs soon be reached. The Liberal-Labour candidate is but a transient
phenomenon of our time, and with his disappearance the storm will
break."[651]
The great Liberal majority was created by accident and it is rapidly
dissolving. "The Liberals succeeded to power through no merit of their
own, but merely through the errors of their opponents. Liberalism is
shedding its supporters at both ends, and is rapidly on the way to
becoming a mere _caput mortuum_."[652] It is true that "at the general
election many Socialists climbed into Parliament on the backs of the
Liberals,"[653] but Liberal-Socialist co-operation is not possible.
Many Socialists believe that Liberalism and Socialism are fundamentally
antagonistic, and that therefore Socialism must fight its battles
unaided. "In Great Britain, as in France, Belgium, Germany, and Italy,
the cleavage has now been definitely marked between capitalist
Liberalism and Socialist Democracy."[654] "Political power, properly
so-called, is merely the organised power of one class for oppressing
another."[655] "All political parties are but the expression of class
interests, and as the interest of the working class is diametrically
opposed to the interests of all sections of the master class, the party
seeking working class emancipation must be hostile to every other
party."[656] "We shall see Liberals and Tories working together in
cordial agreement, as they do in Germany, to prevent the election of
the only politicians who can really profess to go to the poll on the
broad ground of citizenship--labour done by hand or brain for the
community, as apart from idleness and pleasure-seeking supported by
rents, dividends, and interest taken from the community."[657]
"As the machinery of government, including the armed forces of the
nation, exists only to conserve the monopoly by the capitalist class
of the wealth taken from the workers, the working class must organise
consciously and politically for the conquest of the powers of
government, national and local, in order that this machinery,
including these forces, may be converted from an instrument of
oppression into the agent of emancipation and the overthrow of
privilege, aristocratic and plutocratic."[658] "The property question
is the issue which is creating a new political cleavage in the State.
Somewhat dimly at present, but with growing clearness of vision, the
worker begins to see that he will remain a menial, outcast and
forlorn, until he has made himself master of the machine he tends, and
the soil he tills."[659]
"The only true position for a genuine working-class party is that of
open hostility to all who support capitalism in any shape or form.
This is the safe, sure, and scientific position."[660] "Liberals will
declare and do declare in most pathetic tones that they have done
more, and will do more, for the workers than the Tories have done or
will do. And Liberals will assure you that they are really more
anxious to help the workers than we Socialists believe. But those are
side issues. The main thing to remember is, that even if the Liberals
are all they claim to be, they will never do as much for Labour as
Labour could do for itself."[661]
Oh heed not the talk of those fat agitators.
Who prattle of Gladstone, or Churchill, or worse;
Expect not your rights from professional praters,
But manfully trust in your courage and force.[662]
Onward! Sons of Labour! nerve ye for the fray;
Soon shall beam the dawning of a brighter day.
Keep the red flag flying, herald of the free--
On yourselves relying, on to liberty.
See! the coming glory streams across the plains.
Soon the Sons of Labour shall take up the reins.
Then in every nation shall our Cause increase
Till it reigns triumphant--pledge of joy and peace.[663]
On the other hand, there are Socialists who think that Socialism
cannot succeed if it cuts itself adrift from the great national
parties and pursues a purely Socialistic Labour policy. "A member of
an Imperial Parliament is an Imperialist in spite of himself. A party
which concerns itself with sectional interests only will soon cease to
be a party; it will degenerate into a group, and as such it cannot
hope to receive serious backing in the country."[664]
Many Socialists feel confident that they will conquer power by
conquering Parliament. "Parliament has always governed the country in
the interest of the class to which the majority of its members
belonged. It governed in the interest of the country gentlemen in the
old days when they were in a majority in the House of Commons; it has
governed in the interests of the capitalists and employers since they
won a majority by the Reform Bill of 1832; and it will govern in the
interest of the people when the majority is selected from the
wage-earning class."[665] "No sooner shall two hundred Labour members
be firmly seated upon the cross-benches of the House, than both
parties will approach them with bended knee, bringing gold and
frankincense and programmes."[666] "There is a fine impartiality about
the policeman and the soldier, who are the cutting edge of the State
power. They take their wages and obey their orders without asking
questions. If those orders are to demolish the homestead of every
peasant who refuses to take the bread out of his children's mouths in
order that his landlord may have money to spend as an idle gentleman
in London, the soldier obeys. But if his orders were to help the
police to pitch his lordship into Holloway Gaol until he had paid an
income-tax of twenty shillings on every pound of his unearned income,
the soldier would do that with equal devotion to duty, and perhaps
with a certain private zest that might be lacking in the other case.
Now these orders come ultimately from the State, meaning in this
country the House of Commons. A House of Commons consisting of 660
gentlemen and 10 workmen will order the soldier to take money from the
people for the landlords. A House of Commons consisting of 660 workmen
and 10 gentlemen will probably, unless the 660 are fools, order the
soldier to take money from the landlords for the people."[667]
FOOTNOTES:
[618] _John Burns and the Unemployed_, p. 1.
[619] Independent Labour Party, _A Statement of Principles_, p. 3.
[620] Davidson, _The New Book of Kings_, p. 7.
[621] Blatchford, _Britain for the British_, p. 151.
[622] Casey, _Who are the Bloodsuckers?_ p. 16.
[623] Bax, _Outlooks from the New Standpoint_, p. 70.
[624] Councillor Glyde, _Liberal and Tory Hypocrisy_, p. 12.
[625] _Fabian Essays in Socialism_, pp. 39, 40.
[626] Penny, _The Political Labour Movement_, p. 2.
[627] Quelch, _Economics of Labour_, pp. 9, 10.
[628] Leatham, _The Evolution of the Fourth Estate_, p. 11.
[629] _Should the Working-class Support the Liberal Party?_ p. 10.
[630] _Ibid._ p. 19.
[631] Diack, _Socialism and Current Politics_, p. 10.
[632] _Should the Working-class Support the Liberal Party?_ p. 19.
[633] _Clarion_, February 16, 1906.
[634] Penny, _The Political Labour Movement_, p. 2.
[635] _Should the Working-class Support the Liberal Party?_ p. 13.
[636] _Twentieth Century Politics_, p. 4.
[637] Russell Williams, _The Difficulties of Socialism_, pp. 3, 4.
[638] _Twentieth Century Politics_, p. 6.
[639] Penny, _The Political Labour Movement_, p. 4.
[640] _Twentieth Century Politics_, p. 2.
[641] Penny, _The Political Labour Movement_, p. 3.
[642] Bax, _Outlooks from the New Standpoint_, pp. 69, 70.
[643] _New Age_, October 10, 1907.
[644] _Daily News_, January 20, 1906.
[645] _The Reformers' Year Book_, 1906, Preface p. 6.
[646] _Ibid._ 1907, p. 104.
[647] _Ibid._ Preface.
[648] _Clarion_, November 1, 1907.
[649] Leatham, _The Evolution of the Fourth Estate_, p. 14.
[650] Penny, _The Political Labour Movement_, p. 13.
[651] _Socialism and Labour Policy_, p. 14.
[652] _New Age_, November 7, 1907.
[653] _Ibid._
[654] _Clarion_, January 19, 1906.
[655] Marx and Engels, _Manifesto_, p. 22.
[656] _Declaration of Socialist Party of Great Britain_, see Appendix.
[657] Leatham, _The Evolution of the Fourth Estate_, p. 16.
[658] _Declaration of Principles of Socialist Party of Great Britain._
[659] Keir Hardie, _From Serfdom to Socialism_, p. 30.
[660] Marx and Engels, _Manifesto of the Communist Party_, p. 16.
[661] Blatchford, _Britain for the British_, pp. 148, 149.
[662] _Social-Democratic Federation Song Book_, p. 30.
[663] _Clarion Song Book_, p. 21.
[664] _Socialism and Labour Policy_, p. 3.
[665] _What Socialism Is_, p. 3.
[666] Leakey, _Co-operators and Labour Platform_, p. 16.
[667] Shaw, _The Impossibilities of Anarchism_, p. 26.