Socialism As It Is Part 46

When the Caillaux Ministry came into power in 1911, a large number of the most prominent leaders of the Federation of Labor were arrested for partic.i.p.ation in this agitation. But for every arrest many other unionists signed declarations favoring identical principles, and as the whole Federation is wedded to this propaganda, it is more than doubtful if the whole million can be arrested and the propaganda done away with.

This agitation is not directed primarily against possible war, or even exclusively against compulsory military service. Just as the preparations for an insurrectionary general strike in case of war tend to break down the power and prestige of the army, even if war is never declared, so the teaching of insubordination and desertion have the same effect, even if the compulsory armies are replaced by a compulsory militia, having only a few weeks of drill every year, as in Australia, or by a voluntary militia, as in this country. The Socialist world accepts the word of the American Socialists that a militia, if less burdensome, and less obnoxious in many ways than a standing army, may be just as thoroughly reactionary, and quite as hostile to the working cla.s.s. The French Socialists and unionists encourage all general and organized movements among common soldiers. And their ideal in this regard is reached when a whole body of soldiers, for any good cause, revolts--especially at a time of popular demonstrations. During the wine troubles in the south of France, a whole regiment refused to march--and for years afterwards was toasted at Socialist gatherings.

"Military strikes" have also been frequent in Russia as well as in France--and have received the unanimous approval of the Socialists of all countries. No matter how small the causes, Socialists usually justify them, because they consider military discipline in itself wholly an evil--and the worst tyranny of capitalist government. They promote military revolts in favor of great popular causes for a double reason, and they also have a double motive for supporting purely military revolts against militarism. For if Socialists are engaged in a cla.s.s war, which practically all of them believe may, and many believe must, lead to revolution, it is as necessary to disarm the opposing cla.s.ses as it is to abolish military discipline because of its inherent evil. It is this fact that explains the importance of all Socialist efforts against imperialism, colonialism, nationalism, patriotism, war and armies--and not the idea, common among Socialists, that Socialism alone can be relied on to establish permanent international peace.

Moreover, the most successful attacks on existing governments in their coercive and arbitrary aspects, as the Stuttgart resolution suggests (see above), have been when there were threats of an unpopular war. The Socialist attack is then not only leveled against war, but also against armies. A good example is the sending of a delegation of workingmen to Berlin by the French federation at the invitation of that of Germany at the time of the Morocco affair (July, 1911). There the Secretary of the a.s.sociated labor councils of France, Yvetot, made a speech, the importance of which was fully appreciated by the German government, which ordered him to be immediately expelled. His remarks were also appreciated by his German Socialist audience which responded to them by stormy applause lasting several minutes. The sentiments so widely appreciated were contained in the following remarks addressed to the French and German governments:--

"Just try once, you blockheads, to stir up one people against the other, to arm one people against the other, you will see if the peoples won't make an entirely different use of the weapons you put into their hands. Wait and see if the people don't go to war against an entirely different enemy than you expect."

The significance of this declaration was not that it declared war against war, but that, under a certain highly probable contingency of the immediate future, it prepared the minds of the people for the forceful overthrow of capitalist governments.

To the preparations of capitalist governments to revert to military rule in the case of a successful nation-wide general strike, the Socialists reply at present by plans for weakening and disintegrating armies. And they do not hesitate to say that they will use more active measures if capitalist governments persist in what seems to be their present determination to resort to some form of military despotism when the Socialists have won over a majority of the population to their views.

FOOTNOTES:

[277] Eugene V. Debs, "Life and Writings," p. 456.

[278] Tolstoi's Essay ent.i.tled, "Where is the Way Out?"--October, 1900.

[279] Dr. Karl Liebknecht, "Militarismus und Anti-Militarismus"

(brochure).

[280] Dr. Karl Liebknecht, "Militarismus und Anti-Militarismus", (brochure).

[281] George R. Kirkpatrick, "War--What For?" pp. 318-325.

[282] George R. Kirkpatrick, "War--What For?" (Preface).

[283] Bernard Shaw, "John Bull's Other Island," pp. x.x.xix-xliv.

CHAPTER VIII

POLITICAL AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION

"The legal const.i.tution of every period," says Rosa Luxemburg, "is solely a product of revolution. While revolution is the political _act of creation_ of cla.s.s history, legislation is the continued political _growth_ of society. The work of legal reform has in itself no independent driving force outside of the revolution; it moves during each period of history only along that line and for that period of time for which the impetus given to it during the last revolution continues, or, to speak concretely, it moves only in the frame of that form of society which was brought into the world through the last overturn....

Therefore, _the person who speaks for the method of legal reform instead of the conquest of political power and the overthrow of_ [_present day_]

_society is not as a matter of fact seeking, in a quieter, safer, and slower way, the same goal, but a different goal altogether_; namely, instead of bringing about a new social order, merely the accomplis.h.i.+ng of unessential changes in the old one."[284]

It is not that Rosa Luxemburg or any other prominent Socialist underestimates the importance to the Socialist movement of universal suffrage, and of the utilization of our more or less democratic governments for the purpose of reform. She realizes that such democracy as we have to-day is useful to-day, and that in a future crisis it may serve as a lever for overturning the present social order. "Democracy is indispensable," she says, "not because it makes the conquest of political power by the working cla.s.s superfluous, but, on the contrary, because it makes this seizure of power not only necessary, but the only remaining alternative."

From Kautsky and Bebel, who have always been known as strong believers in the possibilities of political action, to the somewhat skeptical revolutionary Socialists of France, the ballot has thus far remained the weapon of first practical importance, even for revolutionary purposes.

Bebel expects some day a great crisis which will go far beyond the power of any merely political means to solve. Kautsky looks forward to more than one great conflict, in which other means will have to be employed, as does also his Socialist critic and opponent, Jaures. But for the present all these men are occupying themselves with politics.

Even those Socialists who are most skeptical of the revolutionary possibilities of political action by no means turn their back upon it.

The French advocate of economic action and revolutionary labor unionism, Lagardelle, who recently surprised some of his French comrades, as I have already pointed out, by running as a candidate for the French Chamber, claimed that he did this in entire consistency with his principles. And even the arch-revolutionary, Gustave Herve, has declared that in spite of all the faults and limitations of political action, revolutionary Socialists must cling to the Socialist Party. Herve had looked with a favorable eye on the formation of a revolutionary organization which was to consist only in part of Socialists and in part of revolutionary labor unionists, but he declared at the last moment that such an organization ought to be only a group within the Socialist Party. A bitter critic of Jaures and also of the orthodox "center" of the party on the ground that their methods are too timid to achieve anything for Socialism in view of the ruthless aggressions of the capitalists, Herve nevertheless said that it was only very exceptional circ.u.mstances that could justify revolutionary Socialists acting against the party organization, even though it seemed to be doing so little effective fighting against the capitalist enemy.

There could be no stronger evidence of the powerful hold of political action even on the most revolutionary Socialists than the summary in which Herve reviews his reasons for this conclusion:--

"_First_: That the only manner of agitating for anti-parliamentarism that succeeds, and is without danger, is before and after electoral periods--showing constantly to the elite of the proletariat the insufficiency and dangers of parliamentarism in general and parliamentarist Socialism in particular;

"_Second_: During electoral periods all propaganda disparaging the possibilities of politics unaided by other forms of action should cease, 'in order not to embroil ourselves with the Socialist ma.s.ses who must be handled carefully at any cost, in the interest of the revolutionary cause';

"_Third_: While the revolutionary Socialists' discontent with the party's moderation and exclusive absorption in the details of politics or reform ought not to lead them to oppose the organization during election periods, it does not follow that revolutionary Socialists can not even at such times continue to preach their principles and proclaim their hatred to the conservative parties and their att.i.tude towards the Parliamentary Socialist Party 'of sympathy mixed with distrust';

"_Fourth_: An exception should be made against certain Socialist candidates who may have taken a scandalously conservative anti-labor and anti-revolutionary position in the legislative session just gone by, and that against the latter there should be a fight to the finish, certain as we are of having with us almost the entire support of the parliamentary Socialist Party."[285]

In a word, Herve proves his democracy by respecting the opinion of the majority of the Socialist Party, because he hopes and believes that it will become revolutionary in his sense of the word. With a strong preference for "direct action," strikes, "sabotage," boycotts, etc., he yet allows his policies to be guided very largely by a political organization.

But Socialist politics are not politics at all in the ordinary sense of the word. They are directed primarily to prepare the people for a great struggle to come. "Situations are approaching," said Bebel at the Congress at Jena, in 1905, "which must of physical necessity lead to catastrophes unless the working cla.s.s develop so rapidly in power, numbers, culture, and insight, that the bourgeoisie lose the desire for catastrophes. We are not seeking a catastrophe,--what use would it be to us? Catastrophes are brought about by the ruling cla.s.ses." Bebel was referring particularly to the possibility and even the probability that the German government might try to destroy the Socialist Party by limiting the right of suffrage or to crush the unions by limiting the right of labor to organize. If he predicted a revolutionary crisis, it was to come from a life-and-death struggle of the working people in self-defense, in a desperate effort to protect economic and political rights, but especially _political_ rights, which, as the labor unionist, von Elm, said at this congress, were "the key to all." A revolutionary conflict was antic.i.p.ated, to be fought out by economic means, but only as part of a political crisis--in which the majority of the people would be on the side of the Socialists and the labor unions. Similarly, in America, Mr. Victor Berger stated at the Socialist Convention of 1908 that he had no doubt that "in order to be able to shoot even, some day, we must have the powers of the political government in our hands, at least to a great extent."

While neither the political revolution involved in the capture of government by Socialist voters, nor the economic revolution that would follow a wholly successful general strike would lead necessarily to revolution in its narrow sense of a great but relatively brief crisis, or to revolutionary violence; while either political or economic overturn, or both, combined in a single movement, might be accomplished peacefully and by degrees, capitalist governments are just as likely to seize the one as the other, as the occasion for attempts at violent repression. A complete political victory would thus lead to the same crisis and violence as a victorious general strike.

As Bebel says, Socialists are not trying to create a revolutionary crisis. But they have little doubt that the capitalists themselves will precipitate one as soon as Socialism becomes truly menacing, as may happen within a few years in some countries. "The politicians of the ruling cla.s.s have reached a condition where they are ready to risk everything upon a single throw of the dice," says Kautsky, on the supposition that Socialism is _already_ a real menace in Germany. "They would rather take their chances in a civil war than endure the fear of a revolution," he continues. "The Socialists on the other hand, not only have no reason to follow suit in this policy of desperation, but should rather seek by every means in their power to postpone any such insane uprising [of the capitalists] even if it be recognized as inevitable, to a time when the proletariat will be so powerful as to be able at once to whip the enraged [capitalist] mob, and to restrain it, so that the one paroxysm shall be its last, and the destruction that it brings and the sacrifice it costs shall be as small as possible."[286]

The majority of Socialists have no inclination towards violence of any kind at the present time, whether domestic or foreign, and will avoid it also for all time if they can. But they fear and expect that the present ruling cla.s.s will undertake violent measures of repression which will inevitably result in a conflict of physical force.

The Civic Federation, of which so many conspicuous Americans have been members (including Grover Cleveland, Andrew Carnegie, August Belmont, Seth Low, Nicholas Murray Butler, and other prominent philanthropists, educators, statesmen, publicists, and multimillionaires), had its earliest origin, to the author's personal knowledge, partly in an effort to divert the energies of the working people from Socialism and revolutionary unionism to the conservative trade unionism of the older British type. It was natural that this organization should give more and more of its attention to an organized warfare against the Socialist movement as the latter continued to grow, and this it has done. Its members have attacked the movement from every quarter, accusing it of a tendency to undermine religion, the family, and true patriotism. But the most direct and important accusation it has made has been that the Socialists are working toward revolutionary violence. In its official organ it has quoted Mr. Debs as saying: "When the revolution comes we will be prepared to take possession and a.s.sume control of every industry." The quotation is fairly chosen, and represents the Socialist standpoint, but if it is to be thoroughly understood it must be taken in connection with other positions taken by the party. No revolution is contemplated, other than one of the overwhelming majority of the people, nor is any violence expected, other than such that may be instigated by a privileged minority in order to prevent the majority from gaining control of the government and industries of the country.

That the Civic Federation writers also understand that the violence may come from above rather than from below is clearly shown in the context of the article in question. The Federation organ also attacks Mrs. J. G.

Phelps Stokes for having said, at Barnard College, that the present government would probably be overturned by the ballot. In answer to this, the Federation's organ said, "Mrs. Stokes is a woman of intelligence and doubtless knows that States are not overturned by ballots." Here is a categorical denial on the part of an organ representing the most powerful privileged element in the country, of the possibility of _peaceful_ political revolution, which can only mean that if a majority desires such a peaceful revolutionary change, the minority now in power will use violence to prevent it. An article by one of the Federation's officials, Ada C. Sweet, in the same number, makes still further disclosures. Among the "fantastic projects and schemes of Socialism," she says, are the demand "that the Const.i.tution be made amendable by a majority vote," and the demand for the abolition of that feature of our government "which makes the Supreme Court the final interpreter and guardian of the federal Const.i.tution." These demands, of course, are becoming common outside of the Socialist Party, and would simply move the United States up to the semi-democratic level of const.i.tutions made during the last half century. Indeed, the judicial precedents that have created an oligarchy of judges in this country, though they have existed for a century, have never been imitated by any country on earth, civilized or uncivilized, with the single exception of Australia. It is these demands, which would not be held even as radical in other countries, which Miss Sweet says cannot be accomplished without violence. If this is so, it means that violence will come from above, and the Socialists would be cowards indeed if they were not ready to resist it.

Miss Sweet contends that "to bring about the first practical experiments" demanded by Socialism "would start such a civil war as the world has never yet seen in all its long history."[287] No doubt the writer, who has held a responsible position with the Civic Federation for years, represents the opinions of her a.s.sociates. Her prediction may be correct, and if so it would indicate that the people who at present control this country and its government, and who have the power to initiate such a civil war, are determined to do so.

While Socialists have no desire for revolutionary violence, being convinced, as they are, that the present generation will see the majority of the voters of every modern country in their ranks, and Socialists by right in possession of the legal powers of government, they nevertheless have never been blind to the readiness of the plutocratic and militaristic forces in control of governments to proceed to illegal _coups d'etat_, to destroy all vestiges of democracy, if thought necessary, and to use every form of violence, as soon as they feel that they are beginning to lose their political power. The evidence that this is already the intention is abundant.

There is no one who has recognized more clearly than the recent "Socialistic" Prime Minister of France (Briand) that the ruling cla.s.ses force the people to fight for every great advance. In the French Socialist Congress of Paris, in 1899, Briand said: "Now I must reply to those of my friends who through an instinctive horror of every kind of violence have been brought to hope that the transformation of society can be the work of evolution alone.... Such certainly are beautiful dreams, but they are only dreams.... In a general way, in every instance, history demonstrates that the people have scarcely obtained anything except what they have been able to take for themselves.... It is not through a fad, and much less through the love of violence, that our party is and must remain revolutionary, but by necessity, one might say by destiny.... In our Congress we have even pointed out forms of revolt, among the first of which are the general strike." In the International Congress at Paris in 1900, Briand again advocated the general strike on the ground that it was "necessary as a pressure on capitalistic society, indispensable for obtaining continued ameliorations of a political and economic kind, and also, under propitious circ.u.mstances, for the purposes of social revolution." Nor can there be any doubt as to the revolutionary meaning of Briand when he advocated the general strike. In 1899 he had said, "One can discuss a strike of soldiers, one can even try to make ready for it ... our young military Socialists busy themselves in making the workingman who is going to quit his shop, and the peasant who is going to desert his fields to go into the barracks, understand that there are duties higher than those discipline would like to impose upon them." I have already quoted his recommendation, made on this occasion, that in the case of a social crisis the soldiers might fire, but need not necessarily fire in the direction suggested by the officers. As late as 1903 he took up the defense of Gustave Herve, when the latter was accused of anti-militarism, and said before the court: "I am glad to declare that I am not led here by a chance client, I am not here to-day as an advocate pleading for his clients. I am here in a complete and full community of ideas with friends, for whom it is less important that I should defend their liberty, than that I should explain and justify their thought and their writings."

There can be no question that the opinions expressed by Briand at this time are approximately those of the majority of the European Socialists to-day. Some of the leading spokesmen of the Socialists are no doubt somewhat more cautious of the form of their statements. But the modifications they would make in Briand's statement would be due, not to any objection in principle, but to expediency and the practical limitations of such measures as he advocates in each given case.

The great majority of Socialists feel that a premature revolutionary crisis at the present moment would endanger or postpone the success of a political revolution, peaceful or otherwise, when the time for it is ripe. The position of Kautsky will show how very cautious the most influential are. The movement has become so strong in Germany that it might be supposed that the German Socialists would no longer fear a test of strength. But this is not the case. They feel, on the contrary that every delay is in their favor, as they are making colossal strides in their organization and propaganda, while the political situation is becoming more and more critical.

"Our recruiting ground," says Kautsky, "to-day includes fully three fourths of the population, probably even more; the number of votes that are given to us do not equal one third of all the voters and not one fourth of all those ent.i.tled to vote. But the rate of progress increases with a leap when the revolutionary spirit is abroad. It is almost inconceivable with what rapidity the ma.s.s of the people reach a clear consciousness of their cla.s.s interests at such a time. Not alone their courage and their belligerency, but their political interest as well, is spurred on in the highest degree through the consciousness that the hour has at last come for them to burst out of the darkness of night into the glory of the full glare of the sun. Even the laziest become industrious, even the most cowardly become brave, and even the most narrow gains a wider view. In such times a single year will accomplish an education of the ma.s.ses that would otherwise have required a generation."[288]

Kautsky's conception of the probable struggle of the future shows that, together with the millions of Socialists he represents, he expects the great crisis to develop gradually out of the present-day struggle. He does not expect a precipitate and comparatively brief struggle like the French Revolution, but rather "long-drawn-out civil wars, if one does not necessarily give to these words the idea of actual slaughter and battles."

"We are revolutionists," Kautsky concludes, "and this is not in the sense that a steam engine is a revolutionist. The social transformation for which we are striving can be attained only through a political revolution, by means of the conquest of political power by the fighting proletariat. The only form of the State in which Socialism can be realized is that of a republic, and a thoroughly democratic republic at that.