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PROLETARIANPETIT-BOURG

AUSTIN LEWIJP c1.W.w PUBLISHING BUREFCJ.CHICFIG

1 1

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I. W.W. LITERATUREI. W. W. Publishing Bureau1001 W. Madison St., Chicago

Pam phlets at 10~ Each, or $3.60 Per HundredI. W. W. History, Structure and Nethods (St . John). revised.Proletarian and Petit Bourgeois (Lew is).Industrial Unionism, the Road to Freedom (Ettor).Eleven Blind Leaders (Williams) .One Big Union, The Greatest Thin g on Earth.Advancing Proletariat (Wood ruff).Revolutionary I. W. W. (Perr y).Sabotage (Flynn).Pa triotism and the Worker (Herre).Onw ard Sweep of the Machine Process (Hanson).

Pamph lets at 10~ Each, or $5.00 Per Hundred.The I . - iV. TV . Song Book.Th e General Strikrh (Haxwoadl; aiso containing Th e LastWar.Th e General Secretarys Report of the Ten th Convention.Revolutionary Writings (Kelly Cole).

Books at Various PricesTh e New Unionism (Tridon), 3.i~ per copy.. .$25,00 per 100Sabotage (Poug et). 35, per copy.. 10.00 per 100Trial of a New Society (Ebrrr), :O c per copy.. 35.00 per 100When the Leaves Com e Ou t (Chaplin), 50~per copy .,.. ..... ..... .... ..... ..... .... 35.00 per 100

I. IV. w . Leali&I. XV. T V . Industrial Znionism (St. John),5c per copy ..,,. .... __ _.. .,_ ,_. ..... ..... . $1.00 per 100High Cost of Living (Dougherty). SC per CO PY .. 1.00 per 100Hbtel and Restaurant Workers (leaflet). . . . . . . .25 per 100Tip s to Railroaders (leaflet). _. . . . . . . . .25 per 100Metal and Machinrry Workers (leaflet). . . . . . .25 per 100Dom estic Workers (leaflet) . . . .25 per 100T o Colored Working Men and Wum tr. . . . . . .30 per 100

Son gs and Mu sic by .Joe Hill.2jc copy: 5 for $1.00: 10 or mo re. 15C each.Workers of the \Vorld, Awake n:Th r Rebel Girl.Dont Take My Papa Away fro-m Me.

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Proletarian and.,Petit-Bourgeois.Marxian Socialism predicates the formation of whatis called the proletarian class. The process of the organ-ization and development of that class is, in fact, the moststriking phenomenon of the present industrial age, for onits organization and development depend the break up ofthe existing system, and the substitution for it, as a suc-cessor, of another industrial system, which for want of abetter name is called socialism.The term socialism at the present time has two dis-tinct concepts, the one standing for the process by whichthe proletariat develops its political and industrial .inde-pendence of the existing capitalistic regime, and the othera more or less hazy objective, which is sometimes calledsocialism and often the co-operative commonwealth.We may ignore this latter as being a sort of -apocalyptic vision.How is the proletariat to obtain the supremacy?According to Marx by the operation of two distinctprocesses-one, the growth of the proletariat itself, therise and progress .of class consciousness, with all theindustrial and political manifestations flowing there-from; the other, the automatic process of capitalism

which necessitates ever more involved and complex in- dustrial machinery, the coming into being, the develop-ment and the perpetuation of combinations. .This process of necessity implies the extinction ofvery large numbers of small competing capitalists, indus-trialists, and merchants, who formed thebackbone of thepresent system in its earlier stages.There can be no real doubt as to the correctness ofthe Marxian predictions with respect to capitalistic de-velopment, for we have now unquestionably the greatercapitalism with al l the legal and political problems which. it involves. As a counterpart also we see the decline in

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2 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURG EOIS

importance of the smaller capitalism which in its turnhas in al l modern communities given rise to certain verydistinct and easily differentiated political manifestations,The question thereon occurs: Is the Marxian theoryof the rise of a revolutionary proletariat correct?Unless this can be shown the whole of the revolu-tionary theory topples, at least as far as the socialistpropaganda is concerned.So we are brought to an examination of the prole-tariat itself and to a somewhat close analysis of its com-ponent parts, that we may the better appreciate the sub-stantia1 power which it actually possesses, with a view ofdetermining its possible effectiveness in a revolutionarystruggle.It will be observed that the term revolutionary isused in the broadest possible sense and is not confined tothose physical manifestations and ebullitions which aregenerally the concomitants and transitory expressions of, politico-social movements but which are not to be con-fused with the movements themselves.The Marxian classification broadly and very satisfac-torily divides modern industrial communities into threebroad sections-the greater and dominant capitalism,which is practically in control; the smaller capitalismwhich has lost control but which stubbornly and inces-santly maintains the fight against the greater capitalism,and the proletariat which is practically, so far, a negli-gible quantity.The Marxian theory predicates the destruction of thepetit bourgeois and the forcible thrusting of that some-what unpleasant individual into the pit of proletarianismwhence he is to come forth as an avenging angel and torepay his sufferings at the hands of the greater capi-talism by the destruction of the latter.But here we encounter somewhat of a check for thebeaten petit bourgeois does not to any extent take sideswith the proletarian and does not furnish that leadershipand brains to the proletarian movement which it was con-

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PROLETARIAN AND PET IT-BOU RGE OIS 3fidently expected that he would. On the other hand, thelater decades have been marked by the growth of whatis called the new middle class which is not revolu-tionary. Indeed, the whole Bernstein controversy whichhas occupied.so much space and generated so much heatrests precisely on this undeniable fact.If we look at the matter from a practical and concretestandpoint it is easily understood why this is so.When a trust takes over the field of an industry itdisposes of its opponents two ways. It buys them outand takes the best brains of the smaller industry into itsown service, the rest it annihilates by sheer force ofeconomic superiority. It is obviously true that the, morevigorous portion of the petite-bourgeoisie thus assimi-lated by the trust does not become revolutionary. Onthe contrary, its interests are henceforth identified withthe interests of the trust of which it has becomeemployee.

Economically, the smaller capitalist has been crushedout by this process, he has become a proletarian inreceipt of a salary. Obviously he cannot be generally ldescribed as a capitalist large or small, and, according tothe Marxian idea, he ought to be ranged with the prole-tarian class, but, as a matter of fact, he is no proletarian.He becomes a good servant of his new master, he acceptsthe political views of his new master as a good servantshould, and he is not to be reckoned as a force with therevolution but as a distinct acquisition to the power ofhis destroyer.

Besides this, large numbers of the middle class areshareholders in the greater capitalist concerns. ThePennsylvania R. R. has twenty-five thousand share-holders and the steel trust an even greater number. Infact, the capital of the great trusts rests largely upon thesubscribed capital of middle-class stockholders. It isclear that the economic interests of these people are notwith any other than the greater capitalism into whichthey hke become merged. -*

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4 ~~o~fxhkm~x AND PETIT-BOUR GEOISThe small fish swallowed is transformed into part ofthe shark, and the petit-bourgeois losing his economic

identity is absorbed in the Nirvana of the greatercapitalism.With respect to thebeaten small bourg,eois, he doesnot count. There is no revolutionary effectiveness in abeaten class, and the defeated small tradesman eithersinks into oblivion, buriid in the slums, the cemeteries ofthe unfit, or perambulates the earth an uneasy ghostentirely out of place in society and tampering with reac-tionary politics, in the ranks of the Roosevelt pseudo-progressives or playing with the Socialist Party.Really, this new middle class did not enter into thecalculation of Marx. It could not have done so, for theeconomic facts of his time did not allow of such ananticipation.He wrote in a milieu of which the dominant note wasthe petite-bourgeoisie, the philistines of the early Vic-torian era.The great concerns were only just beginning to raise. their heads above the welter of the competitive chaos.The mass of the workers, denominated proletarians, hadno political representation, and had not even learned toorganize trade unions on any effective scale, indeed, theywere only just beginning to develop rudimentary formsof these organizations. Marx could see-and surely thatis credit enough for one man-that the greater capitalismwas the next order of the day, and that the proletarianclass must remain as the only effective class with whicha revolution could be made.

As a generalization the conclusion is correct. Itremains practically unassailable in spite of the vehemenceof the attacks made by the Revisionists, but it ignores awhole intermediary period through which we are passingat the present time. It leaves out of consideration thework of the petite-bourgeoisie in the political and socialworld; it does not take into consideration the tremen-dous efforts put forth by that class in antagonism to the

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEOIS -- 5

dominant capitalism, efforts which are distinctly reac-tionary, though apparently progressive, and still less doesit recognize the unexpected vulgarization of the socialistparty by the same petite-bourgeoisie.The British Reform Acts as well as the development .of liberalism in Europe placed the old world on a prac-tical level with the new as regards the influence of thepetite-bourgeoisie. In Europe the old aristrocracy wasmore and more forced to make common cause with thecapitalistic magnates and both landed and moneyed aris-tocracy, forgetting their old differences, were driven intothe same fold.The non-existence of those differences in the UnitedStates made the progress of the latter country in thedirection of economic concentration more easy and thevastly greater opportunities afforded to the individual toprosper economically for a long time obscured the issuebetween the petite-bourgeoisie and the dominant class.In Europe the process of bourgeois development wasretarded by the complications of the fight for liberalism.On the continent that fight is still going on, though in-volved with the introduction of social ameliorative tend-encies on a scale unknown to the liberalism of GreatBritain until very recent times. But as time went on andas the inabil ity of the small bourgeois to maintain a posi-tion on the economic field became more and more obvious,

he was obliged to turn his attention from laissez faire ofwhich he had formerly been the exponent to the veryantithesis of liberalism, to-wit : state interference.Thereupon he began to view with some complacency,the socialist platform which by its denial of laissez faireand its demand for interference with those capitalisticactivities which at the beginning had been the irery basisof liberalism, served to offer some relief from thepressure to which he was subjected.But it will be observed that the small bourgeois- didnot turn his attention to the socialism of Marx with itsproclamation of the class struggle and its insistence upon

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6 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEOlSthe triumph of the proletarian. That would never havedone. The petit-bourgeois was by no means anxious tobecome a proletarian. On the contrary, his grievancewas that he was likely to become one under the pressure

. of the great capitalism.Thus he sought a remedy in State Socialism, or col-lectivism and the Fabian Society of Great Britain becamehis exponent. He favored attacks upon rent, profit andinterest above certain amounts, inheritance taxes, andheavy land and income taxes, extension of governmentworks, and greater governmental control of franchises,and finally a form of collectivism which contemplated theexpropriation of the private owners of the so-calledpublic utilities.

This last form of public ownership was triumphantlyheralded as socialism and a propaganda was set on footby which the political fortunes of the petite-bourgeoisiecame to be linked with those of certain sections of theworking class.As a matter of fact the prevailing influence in thesocialist parties has therefore been not proletarian butpetit bourgeois. Even the membership has borne themark of the small trader though somewhat of a trans-formation is now taking place, but by far the most influ-ential men in the socialist movement are not members ofthe working class, a very curious state of things in amovement which according to its founders restsprimarily upon a proletarian base.In proof of this an analysis of the membership of theSocialist Party in the United States published in the So-cialist Party Official Bulletin for April, 1909, shows thefollowing figures : Laborers, 20 per cent; craftsmen, 41per cent; transportation, 5 per cent: farmers, 17 percent ; commerce, 9 per cent ; professional, 5 per cent;housewives, 3 per cent.Eliminating the 3 per cent credited to housewives, itgives 77 per cent non-proletarian as against 20 per centproletarian in the membership of the Socialist Party

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGE OIS 7itself, in which the proletarian elements might be con-sidered to be the determining factors. It is clear thatso far from the Socialist Party being a proletarian party,it is hardly a working class party, even, for the laborersand craftsmen combined only give 61 per cent as againstthe balance obviously and distinctly petit bourgeois.It will be seen later, moreover, that the term workingclass by no means necessarily implies the term prole-tarian.In fact the Socialist Party is just a rallying groundfor the discontented petit-bourgeois and working class tocoalesce. It is a cave of Adullam, as Robert Lowe wouldhave called it, merely that.It is very obvious that in this borderland we find butscant traces of that proletarianism which is to redeemthe world.

II.We now shift our enquiry to the realm of the workingclass. .In Marxs Capital we find Productive activity, ifwe take out of sight its special form, viz., the usefulcharacter of the labor, is nothing but the expenditure ofhuman labor power . . . it is the expenditure ofsimple labor-power, i. e., of the labor power, which onan average, apart from any special development, exists

in the organism of every ordinary individual. Skilledlabor-power counts only as simple labor-power intensi-tied, or rather as multiplied simple labor, a given quan-tity of skilled being considered equal to a greater quan-tity of simple labor. Experience shows that this reduc-tion is being constantly made. (Vol. I. P. 51 KerrsEdition.) The differentiation between skilled and unskilledlabor is therefore, according to Marx, merely quantita-tive. The proprietors of skilled labor have, however,persisted in regarding it as qualitative and have consid-ered the possession of this particular species of property,

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8 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO ISi. e., a skilled trade, as marking them off from -theunskilled mass.

The trade unions were formed really in defense ofthe property of the particular craft in which the associ-ated members claimed special skill. The protection istwo-fold. First, against the employer, and seeks to regu-late the wages and hours in the special craft, to makespecial arrangements with respect to the conduct of busi-ness, sanitary conditions, lighting, method of collectingwages and a host of other matters which necessarily arisein the course of the production of commodities. Second,against the unskilled mass on the outside, by the regula-tion of apprenticeships, both as to number and duration,the imposition of a high initiation fee, and the paymentof a comparatively large sum as dues. Besides in someof the more highly specialized organizations there hasalways been a marked tendency to crowd out competitorseven in the ranks of the unions-themselves, so as to givethe remainder a better hold on the jobs-in other words,greater security of property.

Protection at the hands of t!le employers has beensought by entering into contracts for the security of theunion position during an agreed period of time, and, inthe case of the more highly specia!ized unions, frequentconferences and gentlemens agreements have taken placein order to prevent the outbreak of hostilities and thedeclaration of strikes and lockouts.In al l this it &ill be noted there is no approach to thatrevolutionary attitude on the part of the proletariat pre-dicted by Marx ; on the contrary, there is no sign of pro-letarianism here at all. The laborer comes on the scene,not as a proletarian, but as the possessor of a specificproperty, to-wit: specialized skill. This property he hasmore or less protected by cornering the market, and heoffers this property for hire or sale just as the employer ,offers his property. In fact, there is a labor market andthere can be no labor market without the existence ofobjects of exchange, that is property on both sides.

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEOIS 9The very phrases which have accompanied the labormovement show this to be the case. A fair days workfor a fair days wage is nothing but a demand that thelaborer should have the price on the market for which heis willing to part with his property. Labor has rights aswell as capital-what is this but a recognition of theproperty in labor power ? Under circumstances in whichthe capitalistic control of the government has become soapparent that the unions have considered it to be essen-tial that they should make an effort to retrieve theirposition by the acquisition of political power, or wherethe unions have grown to such an extent that theireconomic power naturally seeks its political expressionwe get political platforms which express the views ofthese unions. An examination of these views will showthat they do not differ essentially from those of thepetite-bourgeoisie but are directed to the protection ofthemselves in terms of the existing system and do notoffer any real revolutionary tendency.The San Francisco Labor Party platform is one inpoint. In it the rights of capital are fully recognized andthe claim is made that under the banner of trade unionpolitical victory all classes of the community will flourish,a statement which could be made equally well by anypolitical party. In fact, the sole attack on the union laboradministration by its enemies is that it is a political effortto protect the job, to-wit, the property of the, union men,to the detriment of the property of other proprietors, themerchant, the manufacturer and the small capitalist. InEngland, where the unionists went into politics on theirown account under the name of the Independent Labor Party, the essential unity of the union man with thepetite-bourgeoisie has been shown in the fact that theIndependent Labor Party has become little more than anappendage of the Liberal Party. Even the German SocialDemocratic Party cannot be shown to be other than ofthe same stripe, and its success in point of numbers haslain in the political sagacity of its leaders, which has

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IO PROLETARIMV AND PETIT-BO URG EOIS

effected the assembly of liberal elements on a large scaleunder the apparently revolutionary banner of socialism.Australia and other places furnish the same spectacle,and what is called the Socialist victory in Milwaukee isnothing but the triumph of the trade union propertynotion, as an examination of its platform will conclu-sively show.So far then the unions have not made any revolu-tionary attack upon the existing system and the prole-tarianism which is to destroy it obviously does not pro-ceed from them. Their political and even their economicaction is vitiated by the recognition of their craft as aproperty. They make their fight against the capitalistenemy in terms of that property, and thus in terms ofthe present system. As if it were possible to upset asystem in terms of the legal and political notions onwhich that system actually itself depends.

The truth of the above contention is apparent froman examination of the platform of the Socialist Party inso far as it contains the actual and practical proposals ofthat party apart from merely rhetorical flourishes.It will be found to embrace demands which may beconveniently classified under the heads of collectivism;attacks upon the greater capitalism, fulfill ing the aspira-tions of the petite bourgeoisie; and the recognition ofcertain legislative measures which would tend to makethe path of the organized unions more easy, or at least topartially block the attack which the greater capitalism ismaking by judicial decisions upon the organizations.The National platform adopted at the last Nationalconvention, and particularly the State platform of Wis-consin and also of the State of California, on which thelast political contests were waged, are directly in point.You may study them carefully and fail to find anythingof a revolutionary nature in them, if the high-soundingplatitudes of the preambles are excepted.We are forced then to the conclusion that so far theorganized working class has not shown any marked

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO IS II

tendency to the revolutionary attitude of the Marxianprediction.Are we then to abandon the Marxian revolutionnotion as false to historic fact and therefore untenable? By no means, the results so far merely show that theproletarian has not yet begun to operate either in theeconomic or the political field. But he is here and hasto be reckoned with and will in the future begin more andmore completely to prove the truth of the Marxian pre-_\ diction.For, what is a proletarian ? He is one who hasnothing but his labor power to sell, and in addition onewhose labor power is incapable of being turned intoproperty. In that respect he is differentiated from theskilled laborer who by association has to a certain extentbeen able to make his craft a property peculiar to themembers of that craft, and to that extent interfere withfree exchange in the market in terms of his particular

commodity or property. The proletarian can only profitin terms of the profit of the whole class to which hebelongs.In the statement of Marx quoted above it is said thatall labor is economically reducible to unskilled labor andmay be expressed quantitatively in terms of ordinary.unskilled labor.But the truth is even stronger and broader than that

statement. Skilled labor is being qualitatively reducedto terms of unskilled iabor. The crafts are tottering andthe future of the proletariat is no ionger in the hands ofthe aristocracy of labor but is being transformed at anever increasing speed into those of the common labormasses.This comes about by the natural process of theeconomic system and the development of industrialismitself. The element of individual skill, which is thefundamental underlying base of the craft and upon whichthe craftsman relies for his superiority over unskilledlabor, is being rapidly obliterated. Standardization and

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I2 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-B OUR GEO IS

the control of technical processes which become moreand more perfect with the increasing knowledge ofscientific laws and mechanics fling the craftsman inever increasing numbers upon the scrap heap and confis-cate his precious possession, his particular litt le piece ofproperty.The present system which is the great confiscator ofproperty and which in the name of preserving propertyrights destroys all inferior property rights, has him in itsclutch and he has to go the way of the small bourgeois.He cannot save himself.Every strike proves his position to be more and moreprecarious. The scab becomes more and more of a ter-ror to the skilled laborer, even to the highly skilled la-borer, for the scab can so much the more readily nowtake his place. It is not difficult to learn to operate themechanism of modern production, and a few weeks ofemployment of men who began in total ignorance of anindustry are sufficient to make those men competent torun an industry effectively enough, at least, to destroyany chance of the success of the strike.&The scab is for the most part an unskilled laborer.Against him the craftsman contends in vain and he hasno real ground of appeal to him. For has not the crafts-man looked down upon him hitherto as a person posses-sing no specialized trade and therefore no property andhas he not also on these grounds forbidden him the ad-vantages of unionism ?The unskilled man takes the place of the skilled one.If he does so in the iron trade today he will do so inthe building trade tomorrow. In fact he will invade anytrade where men are required and he stands a chance ofmaking even an uncertain living.A force even more powerful in the break up of thecrafts than the progress of mechanism is the other factoron which Marx counted, the process of capitalist, devel- ,opment itself.The formation of the great concerns has broken

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT -BOU RGE OIS I3down the dividing lines of the crafts and has transcendedthe old form of organization of industry in accordan,cewith which the craft organization was formed. Thesmall competing capitalist engaged in a specific and nar-row part of the process of industry has been displacedby the combination of crafts which go to make up anindustry.

The result upon unionism is not difficult to see. Thestriking craftsman finds himself confronted not by com-peting craft employers but by an entire industrial capi-talistic organization in which the enormous resources ofthe combined industry are pitted against the feeble effortsof the craft. It is impossible except in very unusual cir-cumstances for the craft to be able to meet the situation.It opposes to the united strength of the employers onlysuch resources as it can bring to its aid under the cir-cumstances of the particular case, and the result hasbeen, in the majority of recent cases, crushing defeat.Then the craft organization, seeing that its property isgone, and desperate at the loss of that which it has re-lied upon as the only means of saving it from the pit,becomes angry, and the violence which is inseparablefrom strikes of this character supervenes.It is obvious that the craft union is an individual-istic manifestation. Now, physical violence is, as italways has been, the last resource of bafffed individual-ism. To the absolutism of the trust the craftsman re-plies, as does the thwarted Russian revolutionist to theabsolutism of the Czar, and the results are very muchthe same. Now and again the world is shocked by hap-penings in the trade union world, but the absolutism per-sists, just as in Russia, because there is no effective socialattack upon it and because ineffectual acts of violencehave precisely the same effect in trade disputes as inRussian politics of alienating public sympathy from therebel, and strengthening the public belief that after allabsolutism is the only protection from anarchy.The craft unions are thereupon compelled to look in

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14 PROLETARI.4N .4ND PETIT-B OUR GEO ISanother direction and to turn their eyes towards indus-trial unionism as a remedy. Louder and louder thedemand arises that the only way in which the workingclass can expect to achieve progress in face of the oddswhich confront it is by organization in terms of the cap-italist industry, and that means the practical eliminationof the crafts, as protectors of special property interests.That this question is becoming one of first class im-portance even in the Socialist Party is to be seen fromthe following extract from a recent article by Eugene V.Debs. The tone of impatience with the present atti-tude of the Socialist Party wikl be readily noted:Voting for Socialism is not Socialism any more thana menu isa meal.Socialism must be organized, drilled, equipped, andthe place to begin is in the industries where the workersare employed. Their economic power has got to be de-veloped through efficient organization, or their politicalpower, even if it could be developed, would but reactupon them, thwart their plans, and all but destroy them.Such organization to be effective must be expressedin terms of industrial unionism. Each industry mustbe organized-in its entirety, embracing all the workers,and al l working together in the interest of ah, in thetrue spirit of solidarity, thus laying the foundation anddeveloping the superstructure of the new system within.the old, from which it is evolving, and systematically fit-ting the workers, step by step, to assume entire controlof the productive forces when the hour strikes for theimpending organic change.

Without such economic organization and the eco-nomic power with which it is clothed, and without theindustrial co-operation, training, discipline and efficiency,which are its corollaries, the fruit of any political victo-ries the workers may achieve will turn to ashes on theirlips.-International Socialist Review, January, 1910.That the period when trade unionism, by which ofcourse is meant craft unionism, could be considered a

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO IS 15

menace to the existing capitalist institution is past maybe gathered from the following statement from a speechdelivered before the Quill Club of New York by Mr.Paul Morton, President of the Equitable Life InsuranceCompany :

The real object of a labor union should be the trueand ultimate welfare of labor, of the employer, and ofthe country in which it does business. I am a great be-liever in organized labor, but it is a big mistake to mis-direct itself by attempting to bring a good man downto the level of a poor man. Its aim should be to en-courage the man who wants to work and who is effi-cient, and to undertake to educate the inferior man tobecome as good as the best and thereby increase the pro-duction of its organization as a whole. Personally, Ithink it should stand for and not discourage piece-work. Organized labor and organized capital shouldboth stand for efficiency and do everything possible tocreate wealth. I am sure there is no sensible man whowill not entirely approve of a labor organization whichhas efficiency as one of its chief reasons for existing.Without co-operation between labor and capital we can-not meet the competition of the world.-Outlook, Jan-uary 7th, 1911.As a commentary on the above the following extractfrom the speech of Warren S. Stone, Grand Chief ofthe International Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers,is interesting. The speech was made at the last meetingof the Civic Federation on January rzth, 1911 :Let me warn those who are attacking labor unionsthat they are attacking the greatest bulwark standingtoday between property rights and a wave of anarchylike that of the bloody commune which will sweep overthe land if the radical spirits get control of Americanlabor.-New York Call, January 13, 1911.

When the greater capitalist finds approval for thecraft union it is obvious that the latter can no longer beregarded as a very serious protagonist of labor.

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c6 PROLETARIAN AiXD PETIT-BOURGEO ISIt has ceased to have fighting capacity because thatfor which it seeks to fight is already doomed.A new form of organization is taking its place. Thisnew form, called Industrial Unionism, implies more thanthe possession of a more effective weapon by the work-ing class.In fact the advent of industrial unionism brings usback to the fundamental Marxian thesis which was thestarting point of our discussion.

III.The new unionism is of necessity a revolutionarymanifestation. This appears from an examination of itsnecessary structure.It must include all the various kinds of labor re-quired in a specific industry ; labor of every kind whichcontributes to the production of the commodity for themaking of which the industry exists; all the various

factors which combine to form the marketable object.

By al l the kinds of labor we do not mean merely al lthe crafts, but in addition factors which have been over-looked in the organization of crafts-factors which ap-pear at each end of the productive apparatus-at theone end, clerks, salesmen, stenographers, telephone oper-ators, telegraphers, and all the non-handworking staffwhich is essential to the practical handling of a greatbusiness, and at the other end the unskilled laborers whoare equally essential but so far unorganized and un-recognized.Both of these factors have been neglected by thetrade union or rather have failed to come into the realmof operation of the union.The former the union has so far been practicallyunable to affect, because, not being hand workers, theyhave looked down on the unions; the latter, the unionhas neglected because, not being craftsmen but merelyunskilled hands, they have not been considered worthyof the recognition of the union.

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEOIS I7Hence each industry has and now consists of a coreof organized mechanics and operatives, surrounded by

a rind of unorganized, and in the last resort the juice issqueezed out of the organized core through the unor-ganized rind.It must be remembered also that even this organizedportion is not a homogeneous body, and that even thecrafts are not organized in terms of the industry inwhich they operate, but are separate entities. None canbe brought to the assistance of its neighbor without muchdelay and the solution of involved jurisdictional ques-tions. Consequently, we see the craft, even the highlyskilled craft, engaged in a protracted struggle, expendingmoney which it can il l afford and finally yielding to thegreater force or even if it is able to secure such a com-promise as enables the leaders to advertise a victoryit is at such expense as to be a Pyrrhic victory.The plan generally followed is to determine what .amount of strike pay can be given to the men who comeout and having settled that this strike pay can be foundfor at least a time to declare a strike.Thenceforward the process follows a routine. Thestrikers picket, the employer imports scabs ; physical con-flicts arise which necessitate the employment of the po-lice. Both sides engage a corps of lawyers. The scabsstart up the industry. The unions keep on paying strikepay. Finally, one of two things happens, either the em-ployer, by reason of the interruption to his businessloses valuable customers and his business is attacked bycompetitors so that he is compelled to make terms, or. the strike pay gives out and the striking union men aredriven to return to work. It will be observed that theformer alternative is less and less likely to occur withthe growing concentration and the extinction of compe-tition between employers.All this time men not belonging to the crafts actually _engaged in conflict go on with their work. I have knowna building struck by one craft which picketed the build- .

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18 PROLETARIAK AND PETIT-BOU RGEO ISinn, and all the time the members of other crafts, eachman with a union card in his pocket, have walked.everymorning past the pickets of the striking craft and goneto work on the building which was so picketed.A more advanced form of trade organization wouldcombine the crafts on that building and then all the craftswould go out on strike. That result has been achievedand so far progress has been made in certain industries.But the unskilled laborers are unorganized. Therefore,the unskilled swarm upon the task and complete it. Withthe present development of the machine industry it isquite possible to do this; though of course more expen-sive to the employers and in many ways not so satis-factory. These drawbacks, however, will gradually dis-appear-in face of the machine industry, the further elim-ination of craft distinctions and the general-progress oftechnique in production. -This last consists m the con-. stant subdivision of mechanical processes and a tend-ency to the repetition of monotonous acts even more

,easily and quickly learned by the average man withoutspecialized skill.Everything then combines to place the unskilledlaborer in the strategic position in the labor struggle. Hebecomes he one vital factor without which no victory inthe fight between the laborer and the capitalist can bewon. He who has the unskilled laborer has the victory. ,If the employer is able to call to his aid the legions ofthe unskilled and unorganized his victory in the struggleis practically assured to begin with. If organized laboron its part can secure the unskilled its triumph becomesan assured fact.

The foregoing is simply explanatory of the state-ment that industrial unionism of necessity predicates theorganization of the unskilled.The organization of the unskilled in the industrialunion at once places that class of labor in control of thesituation. It can dislocate an industry whenever itchooses o do so. It can practically dictate the terms on

.

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGHXS I9which the so-called skilled trades must operate. Sinceit is largely migratory in character and is used to .theebb and flow of demand lack of employment does nothave the same terrors for its members ; it can managewithout strike pay, and by frequent strikes of short dura-tion can inflict a vast amount of damage upon the enemywithout much suffering to itself. Indeed, in France,where- the organization of the unskilled is being so effec-tively carried out by the Syndicalists, the long strike hasbecome almost extinct. To win or lose in two weeksand go back with the organization intact is the aim ofthe leaders. The superiority of this method over theold fashioned long fought out struggle with the sufferingof families and the expenditure of strike pay is obvious.Industrial conflicts tend to become shorter and sharper.

The unskilled laborer of today is the pure Marxianproletarian; he has nothing but his labor power to sell,and his labor power cannot by any possibility becomeproperty in any sense. He closely approximates to thedefinition in the Communist Manifesto.The proletarian is without property ;-his relation tohis wife.and children has no longer anything in commonwith bourgeois family relations, modern industrial labor,modern subjection to capital, the same in England as inFrance, in America as in Germany, has stripped him ofevery trace of national character. Law, morality, re-ligion are to him so many bourgeois prejudices, behindwhich lurk in ambush just as many bourgeois interests?It is, of course, impossible in the course of a shortpaper to examine the testimony from which the aboveconclusions are reached. It may be noted in passing,however, that the unskilled- laborer is not as a rule avoter; he can seldom stay long enough in one place toacquire residence. He is still more seldom a propertyowner, as so many of the craftsmen are, whose propertyrepresents so much impedimenta in the event of a strike,for it usually consists of a partly paid-up contract for thepurchase of a house and lot. Owing to the present re-

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20 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BO URG EOIS

strictions upon citizenship an ever increasing number ofthe unskilled must remain aliens, for it is very difficulteven for a craftsman to find witnesses covering a periodof five years and it is next to impossible for an unskilledlaborer to do this.The separation between the rest of the communityand the unskilled laborer is therefore practically com-plete. His class stands as a permanently outlawed class.He has no part or lot in the existing social system. Theoccasions when he is interested in the present system arewhen he comes into collision with it and the officers ofthe law inflict every indignity upon him and render hisnecessary migration through the land as difficult and asdangerous as possible.

It will be noted that we are not speaking here oftramps or derelicts, of the social detritus which is con-tinually being thrown off into the fetid pools of profes-sional trampdom and of crime. This derelict or slumelement is quite another factor with which we have nopresent concern. The unskilled laborers referred to arethose who do the rough work of the world ; who workhard where opportunity for work is afforded ; who fi llthe contract camps and mines, harvest the gram andperform the thousand and one tasks upon which we aredependent,.and who form the definite and indispensablesubstratum of every industry.

The theory in the United States at least is that suchemployment is permanent only for the unfit; that thebest elements graduate out of it into more remunerativetoil. The former history of the country goes far to es-tablish that belief. But it is no longer tenable in face ofthe facts. The appropriation of the public lands, thepractical closing of opportunity, the degradation of, thecrafts in face of the consolidation of industry, al l tendnot only to shut the avenue of escape for the unskilledlaborer but to greatly increase his numbers.This mass is already beginning to show signs of in-dependent life. It is not waiting to be organized from

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEOIS 21above, it is trying to organize itself. Slowly and pain-fully it is trying its limbs and exercising hitherto unusedfunctions. Within a few months that portion of the pop-ulation which has been regarded with scorn and whichhas been considered unworthy of recognition by the reg-ular organized trades has made McKees Rocks, Spokane,Lawrence, Little Falls, Canadian Northern, Paterson,Mesaba Iron Range, Fresno and Everett historic namesin the American-labor movement. The Industrial Work-ers of the World may be regarded as the first definitestep in the organization of the real proletariat.

With the advent of the unskilled into the ranks oforganized labor there can be no further blinking or ob-scuring of the real point at issue between the capitalistand the laborer.The unskilled laborer knows without any telling thathe is exploited at the point of production. No questionof taxes can help him, municipalization or nationalizationis no remedy for his ills, no scheme of municipal or otherreforms can meet the circumstances of his case.He challenges the whole structure of modern societyat its base, the contract of employment. He matcheshis no-property against all the property of the dominantclass, his no-law against the law of the industrial andcommercial masters, his ability to starve against all theresources of civilization.When the unskilled laborer enters the fight he dragsthe rest of the crafts after him. They must take up hisfight. Even the respectable petit-bourgeois socialist mustdance to his tune, as is seen in the French chamberwhere the Socialist representatives vigorously took upthe cudgels for purand, the syndicalist, unjustly sen-tenced for the killing of a scab.What is still more remarkable he, by means of theindustrial union, builds up a society within. society, an

imperium in impefio. He consolidates and harmonizesevery branch of wage labor in the industry, until shouldhe declare the present owners expropriated the industry

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22 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT -BOU RGE OIS

would go along its accustomed course in the hands ofthe industrial organization without any shock or jar tothe rest of us.So the fullness of time and capitalistic developmenthave at last brought about the Marxian proletariat.Time, however, the great dispeller of illusions, haswrought its effect upon the mind of that proletariat. Nolonger will it satisfy itself with the belief that parlia-mentary action will bring the relief which it so earnestlydeserves. On the contrary it grows more and more dis-trustful of mere parliamentarism. It has learned thelesson that political power is merely the reflex of eco-nomic power, and that political advantage can only behad through economic superiority ; that there is no roadto power save through the will to power and all thatthat implies.The proletarian, which is just entering the ring as acontestant for the mastery of the modern world, comesequipped with the knowledge that its victories are not tobe won by the babblings of public men and the intriguesof political place-hunters, but by stern conflict on theindustrial field and by ceaseless and relentless war uponthose whom it must expropriate. -

What Comes of Playing the Game.By Charles Edward Russell.A proletarian movement can have no part, howeverslight, in the game of politics. The moment it takes aseat at that grimy board is the moment it dies within.After that it may for a time maintain a semblance oflife and motion, but in truth it is only a corpse.This has been proved many times. It is being provedtoday in Great Britain. It has been proved recently andmost convincingly in the experience of Australia andNew Zealand.

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PROLET;ZRIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEO IS 23In Australia the proletarian movement that beganeighteeen years ago has achieved an absolute triumph-in politics. Under the name of the Labor Party .it haswon all that any political combination can possibly winanywhere. It has played the political game to the limitand taken all the stakes in sight. The whole nationalgovernment is in its hands. It has attained in fullestmeasure to the political success at which it aimed. Itnot merely influences the government; it is the govern-

ment.To make the situation clear by an American analogy,let us suppose the Socialists of America join hands withthe progressive element in the labor unions and withthe different groups of advanced radicals. Let us sup-pose a coalition- party to be formed called the LaborParty. Let us suppose this to have entered the state andnational campaigns, winning at each successive electionmore seats in Congress, and finally, after sixteen yearsin conflict, electing its candidate for President and aclear majority of the Senate and House of Representa-tives. This would be admitted to be the summit of sucha partys aims and to mean great and notable success;and it wou!d closely parallel the situation in Australia.

Exactly such a Labor Party has administered the af-fairs of Australia since April, rgro. Its triumph wasthe political success of a proletarian movement that wassteered into the political game. What has resulted?

This has resulted, that the Labor Party of Australiais now exactly like any other political party and meansno more to the working class except its name. Consti-tuted as the political party of that class, it has beenswept into power by working class votes, and after al-most a year and a half of control of national affairs itcan show nothing more accomplished for working class tinterests than any other party has accomplished. Theworking class under the Labor Party is in essentiallythe same condition that it has been in under al l the other

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24 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT -BOU RGE OISadministrations, nor is there the slightest prospect thatits condition will be changed.

In other words, the whole machine runs on exactlyas before, the vast elaborated machine by which thetoilers are exploited and parasites are fed. Once inpower, the Labor Party proceeded to do such things asother parties had done for the purpose of keeping inpower, and it is these things that maintain the machine.On the night of the election, when the returns beganto indicate the result, the gentleman that is now Attor-ney General of the Commonwealth was in the LaborParty headquarters, jumping up and down with uncon-trollable glee.Were in ! he shouted. Were in! Were in !That was an excellent phrase and neatly expressedthe whole situation. The Labor Party was in; it hadwon the offices and the places of power and honor; ithad defeated the opponents that had often defeated it.It was in. The next thing was to keep in, and this isthe object that it has assiduously pursued ever since.We are in ; now let us stay in. We have the oflices;let us keep the offices.

The first thing it does is to increase its strength withthe bourgeoisie and the great middle class always alliedwith its enemies. To its opponents in the campaignsthe handiest weapon and most effective was always thecharge that the Labor Party was not patriotic, that it didnot love the dear old flag of Great Britain with theproper degree of fervor and ecstasy ; that it was wobblyon the subject of war and held strange, erratic notionsin favor of universal peace instead of yelling day andnight for British supremacy, whether right or wrong-which is well known to be the duty of the true and purepatriot. This argument was continually used and hadgreat effect.Naturally, as the Labor Party was now in and de-termined to stay in, the wise play, indicated in the gameupon which it had embarked, was to disprove all these

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PROLETAkIAN AND PETIT-BOURG EOIS 25damaging allegations and to show that the Labor Partywas just as patriotic as any other party could possiblybe. So its first move was to adopt a system of universalmilitary service, and the next to undertake vast schemesof national defense. The attention and admiration ofthe country were directed to the fact that the Labor ad-ministration was the first to build small arms factories,to revise the military establishment so as to secure thegreatest efficiency and to prepare the nation for deeds ofvalor on the battlefield.At the time this was done there was a crying needfor new labor legislation; the system or lack of systemof arbitrating labor disputes was badly in need of re-pairs ; workingmen were being imprisoned in. some ofthe states. for the crime of striking; the power of gov-ernment was often used to oppress and overawe strikers,even when they had been perfectly orderly and theircause was absolutely just. These, with many other evilsof the workingmans condition, were pushed aside inorder to perfect the defense system and get the smallarms factories in good working order, for such were theplain indications of the game that the Labor Party hadstarted out to play. Were in ; let us stay in.

The next thing to attest properly the true spiritof patritoism that burned and throbbed in the LaborParty was to send the Prime Minister and eighteen mem-bers of Parliament, at public expense, to the coronationpuppet show. The Prime Minister was, in fact, one ofthe bright ornaments of that precious occasion, and wasuniversally admired as he pranced around in knee pantsand other regalia. He is by trade a steam engineer, andfor years lived by the work of his hands. He was saidgreatly to enjoy the gew-gaws of the occasion. I donot know whether this is true, but certainly he presenteda sad and humiliating spectacle as a representative ofthe working class, and one that would never have beenoffered to the tiorld except for the necessity of playingthe game. It would have been bad politics for the

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26 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEO ISLabor Party to have appeared in the least indifferentto the childish and silly tricks of the coronation ; henceit must leave nothing undone to show its loyalty, lest ourenemies get ammunition to use against us and we shallnot be able to stay in. Nothing more absurd and de-grading can be imagined than the participation of anyLabor Party in such a spectacle, but such are the con-ditions of this game. If you start in to play it you mustplay it, and you must play it in the way that will win.Meantime there remains this awkward fact tbout thecondition of the working class. It is no less exploitedthan before. It is as far, apparently, from the day ofjustice under the rule of the Labor Party as it was underthe rule of the Liberal Party. What are you going todo about that? Why, there is nothing to be done aboutthat as yet. The country, you see, is not ready for anyradical measures on that subject. If we undertake tomake any great changes in fundamental conditions weshould be defeated at the next election, and then weshould not be in, but should be out. True, the cost ofliving is steadily increasing, and that means that the stateof the working class is inevitably declining. True, underthe present system power is steadily accumulating in thehands of the exploiters, so that if we are afraid to offendthem now we shall be still more afraid to offend themnext year and the next. But the main thing is to keepin. Were in; let us stay in.Hence, also, the Labor administration has been verycareful not to offend the great money interests andpowerful corporations that are growing up in the coun-try. These influences are too powerful in elections.Nothing has been done that could in the least disturbthe currents of sacred business. It was recognized asnot good politics to antagonize business interests. Letthe administration keep along with the solid business in-terests of the country, reassuring them for the sake ofgeneral prosperity and helping them to go on in thesame safe, sane and conservative way as before. It was

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGE43IS 27essential that business men should feel that business wasjust as secure under the Labor administration as underany other. Nothing that can in the least upset busi-ness, you know. True, this sacred business consists ofschemes to exploit and rob the working class, and, true,the longer it is allowed to go upon its way the morepowerful it becomes and the greater are its exploitationsand profits. But if we do anything that upsets busi-ness, or tends to disturb business confidence, that will bebad for us at the next election. Very likely we shallnot be able to keep in. We are in now; let us stay in,and have the offices and the power.Therefore it is with the greatest pride that the Laborpeople point out that under the Labor administration the. volume of business has not decreased but increased; theoperations of the banks have shown no falling off.; theyare still engaged as profitably as of yore in skinning thepublic; the clearings are in an eminently satisfactorycondition; profits have suffered no decline; al l is well inour marts of trade. The old machine goes on so wellyou would never know there had been any change inthe administration. Business men have confidence inour Party. They know that we will do the right thingby them, and when in the next campaign the wickedorators of the opposition arise and say that the LaborParty is a party of disturbers and revolutionists we canpoint to these facts and overwhelm them. And that willbe a good thing, because otherwise we might not beable to keep in. Were in; let us stay in.So stands the case in Australia. But if anyone saysto me that the heart of the trouble is some defect in themen that are the leaders of the Australian Labor Party,I deny it. There are no leaders of the Australian LaborParty in the sense that American politics understandsleaders. Whoever comes to the front in the. affairs ofthe Australian Labor Party is chosen by a free vote ofthe members of that Party and has not pushed himselfto the front in the manner to which American politicians

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28 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURG EOISare accustomed. And as for the men that hold cabinetpositions in the Labor administration, and therefore maybe regarded as chiefly the advocates of the policy I havehere outlined, if we think that these men are at faultwe shall make the greatest possible error. There areno better men anywhere. Their sincerity is beyondquestion. They believe absolutely in working class gov-ernment, they are personally above reproach, they rep-resent a class of public men that for flawless honestyand purity of purpose is almost unknown in Americanpublic affairs ; I wish we had a thousand like them inour government this day.Nor is there any question about their ability. Theyare among the ablest of al l executives. Every one ofthem, when he came into office, gave a notable exampleof efficiency by studying, simplifying and improving theoperations of his. department. The fault is not withtheir convictions nor with their intellectual resources.The trouble is with the game that they started out toplay. That game has always these results and no others.Whosoever starts to play it must play according to therules, and these are the rules. You sit at the grimyboard to win. If you win you can win in but this way,by continual compromise and by continual sacrifice ofyour principles.Most of these men are Socialists. One of them,Senator George H. Pearce, now the able and efficientMinister for Defense, once delivered in my hearing theclearest and most concise exposition of the fundamentalprinciples of Socialism that I have ever heard anywhere.They are convinced Socialists and they will tell you thattheir ultimate ideal is the Co-operative Commonwealth-when the people are ready for it. And yet, sincerely andtruly believing in the Socialistic theory, they proceed toplay the Capitalists game, because they must play thatgame to keep in. Were in; let us stay in.Meantime, how has thecause of Socialism progressedin Australia? Not at al l. I would by no means dis-

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEOIS 29

parage the efforts of the band of clear-sighted and ablemen and women that in Australia and New Zealandsteadfastly insist upon the truth that nothing will everbe won by palliatives; but the great working population,carried away by the idea of winning political victories, isso far indifferent or hostile toward the only movementthat can really accomplish anything. I know of but oneother country in the civilized circuit where Socialism isso dead. The full attention of the proletariat is cen-tered in the political success of this Labor Party. Itwill give no heed to anything else, and the few men thatwith clear vision and inspiration continue to insist thatthe only way to emancipate the working class is toemancipate it are like the voice of one crying in the wil-derness. If the capitalists had designed the very best .way in which to perpetuate their power they could nothave hit upon anything better for themselves than this.It keeps the working class occupied; it diverts theirminds from the real questions that pertain to their con-dition; it appeals to their sporting instincts; we wantto win, we want to cheer our own victory, we want tostay in; this is the way to these results. And mean-time the capitalists rake off the profits and are happy.We are infinitely better off in the United States. TheLabor Party of Australia has killed the pure proletarianmovement there. At least we have the beginnings ofone here. If there had been no Labor Party there wouldnow be in Australia a promising working class move-ment headed towards industrial emancipation. Having .a Labor Party, there is no such movement in sight.I said a moment ago that there is but one other coun-try in the civilized circuit where Socialism is as dead as, ,it is in Australia. The other country is New Zealand,where the game has been played as assiduously as inAustralia and with identical results.Here is the one spot on earth where the proletarianmovement ought to be, the strongest, and where it is,practically speaking, the weakest.

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30 PROLETARIAN AND PET IT-BOU RGE OISNew Zealand was the first country where the work-ingmen recognized something of their power, the first

country where the labor union was made a part of thegovernment, the first to try to deal adequately with prob-lems of factory conditions and hours of emplopment, thefirst to seek a peaceful solution of the problem of thestrike.Having made years ago so excellent a start, it is dis-couraging to find that the pristine spirit died out so early ;that in these days the first concern of the working class

seems to be the figures, of the ballot bok; and that, whilethe country hasgone over wholly into the control of thecapitalists, the workingman now gets nothing from hisgovernment but an elaborate confidence game andswindle.In the face of injustice and governmental oppressionas bad as anything we know in the United States andsomewhat worse, there is no more revolt in the NewZealand -proletariat than there is in so much putty. Ithas been hypnotized by the political game.Year ;aftkr year the wily gentlemen that hold theoffices and rake off the good things in that country as-sure the workingmen that they are better off than theworkingmen anywhere else in the world, and then fastentheir minds on the Punch and Judy show of an election

that, however it may result,can mean nothing to anytoiler except the right to carry a banner in a paradeand cheer 0i5; tbe streets on election night.Nearly twenty years ago the working class of NewZealand went into politics as a game and won the nom-inal control of the countrys affairs. A telegraph op-erator forgot-all about his fellow workers when he gota cabinet office and accepted knighthood. The carpen-

ters, masons and journalists that led the first movementlost sight of the real labor question as soon as they be-gan to scheme and dream about getting office and keepit. After twenty years of government bv the Labor

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IROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO IS 3Liberal combination, the telegraph operator, now became Prime Minister, slips over to Great Britain a present ofa Dreadnaught battleship, taxes every man, woman andchild in the country ten dollars to pay for the gift, andlnen parades England in the glory of his achievement.Meantime the condition of the workingman, absolutelyand relatively, is worse than it has ever been; the gov-ernment placed in power and held there by working-mens votes gives to them such treatment as you wouldexpect from a member of the National ManufacturersAssociation; and a man that preaches the social revo-lution among them is looked upon as a strange, weirdbeast. What do we want of a social revolution? There.is an election next year, and if you talk like that youmay injure the chances of our candidate. People arenot ready for that sort of thing, you know, and we mustbe practical.Practical-that is a good word, especially in NewZealand. In that country striking has been made prac-tically a crime ; a man that engages in a strike (exceptunder the impossible conditions laid down by the gov-ernment) can be thrown into jail for that mere ac.t alone. .This is the express and practical provision of the statuteand there is no protest against it from the working class.

In New Zealand the government operates a coalmine, wherein it exploits its workers and ,extorts fromthem more labor than private mine owners get; and theworking class makes no protest against that.Men have engaged in a just and necessary strike, andto punish them their homes have been invaded and the msewing machines and lit tle personal belongings of theirwives have been se!zed and confiscated; and the workingclass accepts that.

The system of compulsory arbitration is now beingworked by the capitalist class to keep down wages in acountry where the cost of living rapidly increases; andthe working class endures that.

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32 PROLETARIAN AND SETIT-BOURGEOISFor some years almost every important issue hasbeen decided by the arbitration court against the toiler;and the working class endures that.The government is plainly in alliance with the ex-ploiting corporations, upholds the steamship trust, thecoal trust, the bank trust, the fish trust, the oil trust, andmany other trusts, and although this is perfectly appar-ent to any observer, the working class submits to it.To make any protest and to urge the pure proletarianmovement would not be to the advantage of our party orour candidate. People are not ready for such things yet.If we take an advanced position we shall riot be able tocarry the election.In New Zealand, as in Australia, all workingmen con-tinue to create wealth but do not possess the wealth thatthey create. They continue to toil for the pleasure andaggrandizement of the masters. They continue to liveunder a system that enables idlers, parasites and coggingknaves to ride pleasantly upon the toilers backs; a sys-

tem that makes the poor poorer and the rich richer; thatplaces a premium on dishonesty and penalizes virtue; asystem so ingeniously contrived in deviltry that thegreater the efficiency of the worker the greater theamount of which he is robbed. They continue to liveunder this system and to have no means of protestagainst and no present hope of relief from it, althoughthey know that it condemns four men in every five toexistence below a rational standard of food, shelter, com-fort, leisure and opportunity. They see, or can see ifthey but look around them, that every year the forcesthat establish and maintain these evils become morepowerful in their country and that the difficulty of everdislodging them becomes greater, and against all thisthey have no means of revolt and no impetus thereto,because they have, been bedeviled by the game of politics.They want to elect this man or defeat that, and they en-tirely lose sight of the only thing in the world that is ofreal importance to them or to any of us, and that is the

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO IS 33destruction of the wage system and the emancipation ofthe working class.You say :, Surely it was something gained in NewZealand to secure limited hours of employment, to havesanitary factories, clean luncheon rooms, old age pen-sions, workingmens compensation. Surely all thesethings represented progress and an advance toward thetrue ideal.Yes. But every one of these things has been magni-fied, distorted and exaggerated for the purpose and withthe result of keeping the workingman quiet about morevital things. How say you to that? Every pretendedrelease from his claims has been in fact a new form oftether on his limbs. What about that? I should thinkmeanly of myself if I did not rejoice every time a work-ingmans hours are reduced or the place wherein he iscondemned to toi l is made more nearly tolerable. Butwhat shall we conclude when these things are deliber-ately employed to distract his thoughts from fundamen-tal conditions and when all this state of stagnation iswrought by the alluring game of politics ?I cannot help thinking that all this has or ought tohave a lesson for the Socialist movement in America.If it be desired to kill that movement the most effectiveway would be to get it entangled in some form of prac-tical politics. Then the real and true aim of the move-ment can at once be lost sight of and this party can go theway of every other proletarian party down to the pit. I .should not think that was a very good way to go.When we come to reason of it calmly what can begained by electing any human being to any office beneaththe skies ? To get in and keep in does not seem any sortof an object to anyone that will contemplate the possi-bilities of the Co-operative Commonwealth. How shallit profit the working class to have Mr. Smith madesheriff or Mr. Jones become the coroner? Somethingelse surely is the goal of this magnificent inspiration. InEngland the radicals have al l gone mad on the spbject

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34 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO ISof a successful parliamentary party, the winning of thegovernment, the fil ling of offices and the like. I am toldthat the leaders of the coalition movement have alreadypicked out their prime minister against the day whenthey shall carry the country and be in. In the meantimethey too must play this game carefully, being constantlyon their guard against doing anything that would alarmor antagonize the bourgeoisie and sacred businesses andtelling the workers to wait until we get in. I do not seethat al l this relieves the situation in Whitechapel or thatany fewer men and women live. in misery because we.have a prospect of getting in.Furthermore, to speak quite frankly, I do not seewhere there is a particle of inspiration for Americans inany of these English speaking countries. So far as Ican make out the whole of mankind that dwells underthe British flag is more or less mad about political suc-cess, parliament and getting in. They say in New Zea-land that the government can make a conservative of any radical, if he threatens to become dangerous, bygiving him some tin-horn honor or a place in the upperchamber. In England we have seen too often that thesame kind of influences can silence a radical by invitinghim to the kings garden party or allowing him to shakehands with a lord. I do not believe we have anythingto learn from these countries except what to avoid. AndI do not know why we should not look for an Americanideal in Socialism that will listen to no compromise, playno games in politics, care nothing for temporary successat the polls, seek to elect no particular individual to anyoffice, never lower the standard, look beyond the skirm-ishes of the day, and following unhesitatingly and con-fidently the one ideal of the emancipation of the workingclass as the only object to which it will pay any atten-tion.

Socialism or nothi;g. If this cause of Socialism isworth believing in it is worth following to the end with-out compromise. Either it is the greatest boon, incom-. l

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEOIS 35parably, that ever was dreamed of for the human race,or we are a lot of lunatics. If it is what we believe itto be, then what shall we gain for it by compromise orcoalition or turning for one moment from the ultimategoal ? All the offices in the world-what are they worthconQared with putting an erid to wage slavery?

THOSE WHO OWN AND THOSE WHO WORK.*By Scott Nearing.

Those who own and those who work face each other.The worker demands a return for his work. The ownerdemands a return for his ownership. The rapid growthof property values during recent years has accentuatedand emchasized the conflict between work and ownership.On the one hand, are the people who devote their timeand energy to the production of wealth. On the otherhand are the people who own income-yielding property.The workers receive a wage or a salary ; the ownersreceive payments of rent, interest and dividends. Manyof the workers are growing clamorous over humanrights. The property owners, persistent, and everwatchful, urge the rights of property. The time hascome when the claims of the contending interests mustbe analyzed and understood.A clearer idea of the points at issue will be assuredif the term property income is applied to the returnsthat accrue from ownership and the term service in-come is applied to the returns that accrue from theexpenditure of time and ener,v in the rendering ofservice. All regular income owns its origin to one of- these two sources.The owners of property bulwark themselves with cer-tain prerogatives that have proved of the greatest impor-

*This same line of argument and much of the followingmaterial will be found in Income, Scott Nearing. The Mac-Millan Company, Chapter 7.

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36 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO IStance in the conservation of property interests. Speakingbroadly, there are four characteristic features of theshares of income which are derived from the ownershipof property. First, property income enjoys priority inits claims upon the proceeds of industry. Second,b thevicissitudes of industry affect property in come lesssharply than they affect service income. Third, income-yielding property exhibits a tendency to concentrate inthe hands of a small fraction of the people. The totaleffect of these characteristics 6f property income is stu-pendous. The priority, regularity, permanence and con-centrability of property income combine to place the own-ers of modern income-yielding property in a position ofeconomic security that surpasses the dreams of past ages.Those who are giving their time and energy to the .production of wealth, face the fact that property rightshave been so construed as to give property owners afirst claim on production and to make property incomea fixed charge on the industry of the community. Thispriority of claim has played a leading part in raisingproperty to a position of supremacy in the economicworld.The risks of ifldustry, the burden of economic uncertainty, and the losses incident to the dislocationS of theindustrial systems are carried in the first instance bylabor. The fiist appearance of hard times is folltiwed bya decrease in the working force. The least curtailmentin orders leads to part-time work. Wage rates are notcut-that method is crude and disastrous-but men andwomen are laid off temporarily or permanently. Bondsstill draw their interest ; the dividends are paid on stocks ;. and labor waits for a job. The defender of property in- come will say at once,-If there is nothing to do, whypay labor ? The counter question is obvious. If thereis nothing to do, why pay capital ? Ah, responds thepropertied interests, you can get rid of the laborer byfiring him, but the investment still stands. That answers carries the essential distinction in priority between the

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO IS 37position of the property owner and of the worker. Mines,railroads, factories, and machinery, cannot be laid off.Through good times and bad, they are a fixed charge,unless the business wishes to face bankruptcy proceed-ings. The most important obligation of a modern busi-ness is the interest on its bonded debt. Wages and sal-aries may stop, but interest on bonds must continue ifthe business is to remain solvent.Thus land owners, the owners of bonds and mort-gages, and in late years, the owners of stocks as well, havesaddled their property ownership claims on society. Theyare possessed of the vitals of present-day economic life.Armed with tit le deeds to natural resources and to ma-chinery alike, they are in a position to dictate terms tothe remainder of mankind. Before a tree can be cut ora ton of coal mined ; before a wheel can turn or a loco-motive speed along the steel pathway ; before a wage-earner can raise a hand to labor for himself and his fam-ily, the proper owners must be assured that they will re-cerve a specified rate of return on their holdings.Society, for the use of the earth which was here be-fore our forefathers came, and for the use of the ma-chinery of production which the people of America havespent three centuries in building, must pay a royalty, ortax, to the owners of land of machinery. The methodby which the owners came into possession of this prop-erty is scarcely brought into question. As owners, theyare entitled to the first fruits.The point is well illustrated by an analysis of theway in which periods of prosperity and of adversityaffect the shares of income. First, take railroad earn-ings. During a good year, a regular rate-say 5 percent.-is paid on bonds. The earnings being high, a div-idend of 8 per cent is paid on the stock. The generalrun of wages and salaries remains the same, althoughthey are increased in a few departments. A bad yearensues. The interest on the bonds is paid at the samerate as. in a good year. Earnings are low, therefore

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38 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGE OISthe dividends on the stock are cut from 8 to 5 per cent.There are less freight and fewer passengers to carry.No new construction work is undertaken ; therefore, aquarter of the railroad employees are dropped from thepay rolls. No reduction is made in wages; the wageearner is simply denied the opportunity to earn a living.Interest must continue, else bankruptcy ensues. Divi-dends may be, and frequently are, cut or passed. Earn-ings for a considerable proportion of the employees stopabsolutely. In other industries, such as textile manu-facturing and coal mining, instead of dismissing em-ployees, the establishment is worked two or three, orperhaps four days a week during bad times. The inter-est on the bonds is, of course, paid. Dividends on thestock may be passed or paid out of surplus. Wages aredecreased by the simple methods of part-time work. Inshort, the incorporation of industry, involving the issueof stocks and bonds, creates a situation in which, duringperiods of adversity, the chief burden is borne by theemployees; and year in and year out, through adversityand prosperity, interest is paid to bondholders. Exactlythe same thing is true of the rent of land. In good yearsand bad years alike, the tenants must pay the sameamount. Certain forms of vested income thus continue,while earned income and the opportunity to earn incomeare dependent on the caprice of industry.

Heretofore the bonds of an industrial enterprise havebeen looked upon as the stable form cif security. Thedevelopment of law and of public opinion has renderedthem ironclad. The United States Commission of In-ternal Revenue reports, for the corporations comingunder its purview,.a bonded indebtedness of $34,749,516,-354. Here is a fund, which at the very outset will yieldat 5 per cent, a bi llion and three quarters annually.The same security which now surrounds bonds, isbeing gradually thrown around stock issues. In daysgone by, stock issues were not taken seriously. Today,the right to pay a 6 per cent return on stock-even if

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO IS 39the issue did not originally represent value invested-isbeing recognized in court decisions, in the decisions ofrailroad commissions, and in the attitude of industrytoward income. Thus there has been effected a reversalin the relation between property claims and the claimsof labor. Time was when property shouldered the giveand .take-the profits of industry. If there was a leanyear, profits were small. They were larger in fat years.The man invested his money, took the risk involved,and was paid for it.At present, labor shoulders the give and take of pros-perous and adverse years. When times are bad, menare laid off. Orders decrease, and part-time automat-ically ensues. Meanwhile the snipping of couponssounds at regular, unvaried intervals, and the book inwhich dividend checks are drawn is busy four timesevery year.Modern business practice has wielded an immenseinfluence in the direction of property permanence. Athousand dollars, once invested, is virtually immortal,unless it is stolen, or disposed of in some extra legal way.Depreciation, amortization, insurance and special surplus-fund charges throw around income earning property alarge guarantee of safety. -Any failure in the perpetuityof the property values is due to inadvertence or impo-tence in the property interests. For centuries the thoughtand effort of the business world have been directedtoward the increasing permanence of property rights.The efforts of the propertied interests have been ex-erted to good purpose. The public, mind, the laws andconstitutions, the forms of judicial practice-in short, allof the social forces that were of advantage have beenbent to the guarantee of property income permanence.Granted the continuance of the present system ofproperty, the student trembles to think of the task instore for the toiler of the future. Each year, besides pro-ducing wealth in sufficient quantities to provide for him-self and his family, he must devote a large portion of his

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40 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEO ISenergies to the provision of income for the owners of avast and ever-growing body of immortalized propertyrights and interests.Men look with pretended aversion toward the FeudalSvstem-an organization of society under which the no-bility and the priestcraft, through the control of thenatural resources (agricultural land) were able to liveupon the efforts of the great mass of the people. Is.itnot time to turn from the perspective of history to therealities of the present day economic organizations? Here,in the twentieth century, civilization of the WesternWorld is an economic system which automatically. turnsinto the coffers of those who control the natural resources(forests, ore, coal, fertile land) an endless stream ofwealth. As rent ate up the fruits of a mans energy,under feudalism, interest and dividends do likewise underthe modern system of industrialism, which has given toincome-yielding property a permanence that rivals thatestate held by the mediaval landlord.There is one further feature of the property incomesituation which cannot be dismissed without a word ofcomment-that is the tendency of property income toconcentrate in the hands of a small group of the popula-tion. The tendency is revealed by the record of wealthdistribution in every society about which history con-tains a page. It is present, no one can say with whatimpetus, in the United States today.The present system of property ownership places nolimitations on the amount of income-yielding propertywhich one individual may control. The Rockefellers,Guggenheims and Carnegies may secure title to a hun-dred-thousand, a hundred-million, or a hundred-billionestate. There is nothing in the custom or law of the landto check such a procedure, and in the course of the under-taking, business practice affords every conceivable advan-tage. The modem property-owning world is organizedon the assumption that every man has a right to as muchproperty as he can get. Under the circumstances, it is

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOURGEOIS 41not strange that there has been a very considerable con-centration of property ownership in a comparatively fewhands.The rapidity with which large fortunes have beenacquired is one of the wonders of the modern world. Atthe present time, the United States numbers its million-aires by thousands. The mere mention of such names asVanderbilt, Gould, Astor, Rockefeller, Morgan, Have-meyer, Belmont, Whitney, Goelet, Carnegie, Armour,Harriman and DuPont (all of them families numberedamong the multi-millionaires whose wealth was acquired,for the most part, since the Civil War) calls to mind theimmense concentration of income-yielding wealth whichhas been going on within the past century. The indus-trial system is interwined with a device known as privateproperty in income-yielding wealth, which leads inevi-tably to the concentration of property income in the handsof a comparatively small portion of the population.

The exact figures showing the concentration of prop-erty values are unobtainable, and of no great moment inthe present discussion. The tendency of income-yieldingproperty to concentrate in a relatively small number ofhands is evident on every side. The extent of the con-centration cannot, and need not, be ascertained with accu-racy.The actual amounts paid to the men and women whodo the work of the industrial world are extremely small.Current wage rates, placed side by side with the expenseaccounts of thousands of families whose sole claim toincome rests upon their ownership of property, are star-tling in their paucity. Five hundred dollars a year paidto an able-bodied man whose back was bent three hun-dred days of the year in his efforts to support a wife andfour small children ; seven dollars a week to the anemicman whose eye races with his machine along the seamsof ladies coats ; fifteen dollars a week to a mechanic,keeping a family in a big city ; a thousand dollars a yearto a skilled artisan. These wage rates are meagre when

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42 PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-BOU RGEOIScontrasted with the returns to the men who own thevaluable property of the country.

More than nine-tenths of those who are at work inorganized industry are clerks or wage-earners. Among.male clerks and wage-earners an annual return of $1,000is exceptional, while $I,~o is almost unique. Almostthe entire male wage-earning population receives lessthan $1,500 per year ; most of it receives less than $1,000,and ful l half of it falls under $6~. The incomes ofwomen fall far below those of men. At the same timethe owners of property receive an annual income of manybillions. The facts adduced in the present investigationtend to show at least six billions of property income-asum sufficient to support the twelve million poorest fam-ilies in the United States on their present level of exist-ence, or to add $300 per year to the income of everyfamily in the United States. The amount now paid inproperty income, distributed among the producers, wouldprobably raise every family income in the United States.to a level of decency or efficiency.Property income is relatively stable. Numerous andeffective safeguards have been thrown around it. Despiteoccasional breaks in the abatis protecting property in-come rights, as a general rule, the defenses erected bythe propertied classes have proved well-nigh impregnable.With those receiving service income the situation isfar different. Excepting the small percentage of high-salaried workers, the great mass of those who receiveservice income are forced to struggle in a sea of eco-nomic uncertainties. There are five forces always con-fronting the workers, any one of which may reduce orentirely eliminate service income. They are (I) over-work, (2) sickness and accidents, (3) invention of newmachinery, (4) shutting-down of individual plants and(5) industrial crises.Under the strain incident to overwork, a man maybreak down at forty and be discharged because he isphysically or nervously unable to continue with his

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PROLETARIAN AND PETIT-ROUR GEO IS 43duties. Modern, industry is run at a terrific speed whichleads inevitably to a shortened working life, or de-creased efficiency. The speeding-up system clearly placesa premium on youth and vigor and aserious handicapon age. This fact the companies are not slow to recog-nize. They do not want old men on their pay-rolls-andthey say so, clearly and emphatically. There are manyindustries in which men are expected to go to piecesbefore reaching normal old age. The pace is set high,and those who cannot keep it, must drop out or take lesslucrative positions.Industry offers the workingman an opportunity toearn a living, subject to the caprice of overwork, sick-ness, accidents, new machinery, individual shut-downs*and general suspensions of industrial activity-a hier-archy of forces which overshadow every movement ofhis life, threatening continually to hurl him into an abyssof hardship and misery. Any one, or any combinationof these five forces, may, at any time, diminish, tem-porarily or permanently, the income-earning capacity ofthe worker. All of them are beyond his individual con-trol, yet they strike, with mericless certainty, the sourcesof livelihood of the family in which they occur.The nation is built on the work of i:s workers.Today, as in every past age, the idler and the para-site are burdens on national life. They add nothing tonational well-being, while they cost their keep.- The workers are the nation. As they thrive, thenation thrives. As they succeed in life, the nation isprosperous and great. The future of the nation is in-separable from the future of the nations workers. Itwas not for nothing that Capt. John Smith insisted,-He who will not work, neither shall he eat.Fronted by these facts, we are deliberately workingout an economic system which glorifies 0wnershi.p andpenalizes ivork. The owner prospers; the worker exists.The owner lives upon the fat of the land, w&h theworker has created.

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44 PROLETARIAN AND PET IT-BOU RGP OTSA survey of the relative positions occupied by therecipients of service and of property income, shows

that the property owners hold practically al l of thestrategic points. They are supported by tradition; bul-warked by custom, and protected by ,most of the motiveforces of society. The social mind and the social struc-ture alike have been sha