THE NEW LEADER
THE NEW LEADER THE, NEW LEADER greets ita readers and loyal supporters with confidence thajt U will merit their hearty support. We are not ol thosr who believe that the point of View is...
...That this is possible might be easily surmised from the fact that similar conditions give rise to similar ideas...
...Is "honest" a cold and colorless word) Not if one really means it, Most of us are honest in a formal, negative, externa) way...
...Perhaps that is just the kind of a monument he would have desired...
...it has won the affection of those who appreciate devotion to convictions when men and women were mobbed, jailed, ostracized, or deported by the crazed tools and dupes of a reactionary class...
...FELIPE CARRILLO Socialists everywhere will sorrow at the death of Felipe Carrillo, Socialist Governor of Yucatan, who was murdered by the counter-revolutionists...
...Nowhere in the world has the origin, of capital been so apparent, except to the economists, as in the United States...
...Never mind the Soviet of oil, railroads, coal, and banks that rules at Washington...
...Men like Gladstone and Woodrow Wilson have scuttled whole cargoes of "liberals" and "progressives" and other gudgeons await the same fate...
...The working class is being developed and disciplined by socialevolution to play a great role in history...
...On the other hand, the Socialist interpretation of modern civilization has been verified by events in the past nine years...
...We have been gagged...
...Not a few careerists, and certainly some charlatans, take refuge behind these names...
...But we have our own self-respect...
...SOCIALISM, AN "IMPORTATION" 4 4 Q Q C 1 A L I S M as an orthodox importation is nothing but a mess in the United States," observes Norman Hapgood in Hearst's international for January...
...W e W seen many of those who«werej formerly with us attracted by the imperialist vendors of hokum...
...They must introduce it to their friends and so extend its circulation and influence until it is a power in shaping the thought and action of the working class...
...We have been mobbed and jailed...
...This cannot lie reconciled with science or history...
...The rest was easy...
...The New Leader will heartily support the struggles of the workers for shorter hours, more income, better sanitary conditions, and increasing control of industry...
...That its own objective is the same way be seen from its declaration of principles: To secure for the producers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry, and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible, upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry by service...
...A philosophy of society and history that has thundered its lessons through giant guns...
...Gleason was modest to a fault—liberally ito a fault, tor his good influence might have been greater than it was had he been Jess loth I...
...Long life and usefulness to both of them 1 Boris Brasol, representative of the Grand Duke Cyril of Russia, denies that the latter has given up his rights to the Russian throne...
...The East Side Socialist Center is destined to be the nucleus of a great political and educational movement that will fully justify the difficulties that had to br overcome in its establishment...
...The laboring masses, black and white, produced that original surplus Which formed the In si installments of private capital in the colonies...
...Ignore the rise of nearly a dozen dictators in Europe and tell us that we would "destroy democracy...
...Forget Coondge's advice to the plundered farmers that "nb resort to the public Treasury will be df any permanent value in establishing agriculture," and then urge that a few millions be handed over to the shipping interests...
...This was seventeen years before the Manifesto was written...
...Perhaps no one is to blame...
...The Socialist Party is here to stay...
...The Popular Mechanics Magazine carries a., item to the effect that the hunt for the origin of America's name leads to the Dark Ages...
...Considering the development of tools which have enabled society to ^produce wealth in ever greater abundance, the writer brings us to the time when a man accumuI lated a little surplus "for idleness, or for leisure to construct a new iniplement...
...1 The folklore of the infant days of political economy is served as twentieth century wisdom...
...Not so many are actively and positively honest—whole-hearted and intellectually as well as morally straight-»'Hi.HI r of one piece," as the Germans say...
...I here is much more of interest in the further developmen of capital which we cannot consider here, but in outline the above are the main facts...
...The "progressive" in this country would faint if asked to subscribe to this declaration...
...uch "unpatriotic" discontent as we represent...
...We are inclined to think that the hunters are on the right trail...
...The latter course should take the following form: In the face of the prostration of capitalism abroad tell us that Socialism "will not work...
...They were used for a time and then cast aside by their employers...
...Carrillo, the Socialist, the peon, the revolutionist, who did so much for his own people, still had time to think of interests that were not bounded by the frontiers* of his State...
...In a word, The New Leader will be a publication devoted to the Socialist Party and will aid in rebuilding the Socialist movement in the United States...
...Many rulers in countries that call themselves "enlightened" cannot say as much for themselves...
...At the same time, we shall avoid those droll ! humorists, the Communists, and their bizarre programs, "theses," catechisms, I manifestoes, and the like...
...The theme has endless .variations and you are capable of working it for all that it is worth...
...f • s* THE FOLKLORE ECONOMISTS No- economist of modern times has done more to maintain the prestige of what Thornstein Beblen calls "the folklore of political economy" than J. Laurence Laughlin...
...All this serves as a good lead in dealing with...
...To the masses whom he had served so well, and would have served yet more fruitfully had his life been spared, Arthur* Gleason'» personality was almost unknown He had never been much in the limelight, and so his passing had not very much "news value...
...Be happy in the knowledge that you are serving your beloved country, to say nothing of the Christian gentlemen who have gathered it in as their corporate property to be administered for their ease and happiness...
...Within each nation the struggle between the classes growl ever sharper...
...Into the Socialist Party has gone the devotion and sacrifice of thousanda of workers in the past twenty-two years...
...u Bur m this ease the view of Socialist ideas as an "importation" reveals lack of information of American history...
...We have seen still others who left us adopt programs in anticipation of imminent social upheaval in me United States...
...We think now of the "war for democracy" what we thought of it in 1917...
...The colonial governments in the possession of the owners of this early forrrfof capital were the coercive agencies for keeping the laborers to their tasks...
...Because in this accumulation we date "the birth of capital...
...The New Leader is Socialist in its point of view...
...When expeditions from New York were investigating the great Mayan ruins in Yucatan a year ago, investigations that have resulted in remarkable discoveries of the greatest importance to history, science and archaeology, they found Governor Carrillo of the greatest aid to them...
...The International is the fourth Labor bank in the city, and it is peculiarly the property of those unions and organizations that are closest to tho Socialist movement...
...Arthur Gleason w^s...
...Forget that legislation in this country for several years tends to standardize opinions, conscript labor for the owners of capital, and regulate thought, and tell us that we would "reduce all to a dead level...
...Many others are coming to think as we do...
...We were not taken in by swindlers...
...The day following the opening of the Fast Side Socialist Center the International Bank threw open its doors to the public...
...It is affiliated with a socialist international whose objective is the reorganization of capitalism on a Socialist basis...
...In this country this folklore i a a source of comfort to our capitalisfTiobility who are generous in endowing chairs of political economy that this folklore may be drummed irlto the heads of unsuspecting youth...
...Declarations avowing the existence of class struggles .were made as early as 1830 in this country...
...We shall 'support the idea of a labor party that will include the powerful trade unions whenever they are ready to act, but we cannot follow any ill-defined and vague "liberal" or "progressive" party rooted in temporary discontent and not specifically aiming at the overthrow of capitalism...
...It does not have all the virtues* but in the triumph of its claims for emancipation is bound up the p c o L c jiud Jecuuty of a warlcsa world...
...The present capitalist "order" is not final, no more than the regime of feudalism was...
...Remain blissfully ignorant of the war loot taken by our glorified profiteers and tell us that we Socialists would "confiscate" everything, including your servile salaries...
...When folklore is driven out of political economy science and history may have a chance, but not before...
...That role is to liberate modam society from the crazy contradistinctions in which it is now caught...
...We shall urge the recognition of Russia and take pleasure in puncturing the anti-Soviet fairy tales turned out by the rumor factories of the kept press...
...Some were kidnapped, some were beguiled, others were imported as convicts and political offenders from England...
...Roberto-Haberman, long an intimate, associate and comrade of Carrillo, writes a touching Tribute to him i n tlwu iiiuue of Now L O C M L M W — . - . . ' M — Another side of that man who gave his life for the peons should also be mentioned, his Work for science...
...Our editorial staff will make The New Leader indispensable to them...
...He might just as well have said that music, and science and art are importationsIs it not queer that many who are regarded as having open minds will lapse into the idea that opinions are taboo if it can be said that they have their origin across the frontier...
...publication that will interpret current events and tendencies in the labor movement, in industiy...
...a Socialist...
...Considering this recent history, there is urgent need for The New Leader...
...THE NEW LEADER THE, NEW LEADER greets ita readers and loyal supporters with confidence thajt U will merit their hearty support...
...Hapgood is no more fortunate when he refers to the British Labor Party as "the most powerful progressive party in the world...
...It was this rarer kind of honesty that distinguished Gleason from the greater number of the so-called "intellectuals" who concern themselves with Labor problems...
...The New Leader calls to the colors those veterans and enthusiasts, hundreds of whom havrf already responded'from all parts of the country with subscriptions and letters of encouragement and which forecast a bright future for it...
...It is published to supportthe Socialist Party...
...It is no acci-1 dent that these two types may eventually j meet on common ground...
...Socialism is not an importajkm in any country...
...It has its origin in the seizure of lands, piracy and the slave trade, Even before the Negro was seized in Africa and brought to Virginia to enjoy the task of working for his Christian masters, the white laborers of Europe were sold into limited servitude in America...
...It has gone through the fires of persecution...
...in politics,and international relations...
...Therefore he neither flattered the Labor movement nor impatiently scolded it, nor sought leadership within it, but found out what he could do that it needed done, and did just that in simple good faith...
...Capital had its origin not in the honesty, hard work and Christian virtues of brotherhood, but in usurpation, robbery and force...
...that anticipated the grab and loot of the peace treaties and the abysmal reaction of the exponents of "democfkiky^ ht a philosophy which we are proud to defend...
...While believing that this lis the mission of the next great class in hisj tory, we shall not make the mistake of glorifying the working class...
...There is every reason for believing* that the Fourth Estate, the Working class, will play the chief and most important role in rej organizing society on a basis of cooperative ownership and administering it on a basis of democratic equity...
...In the Yale Review for January Professor Laughlin .treats his readers to an article on "The Logic of Capitalism...
...FIRST AID TO THE ENEMY THE NEW LEADER is not averse to offering first aid to editors of the more reactionary press upon the appearance of this first issue...
...We have lost nothing worth while during these tragic nine years...
...THE Socialist and Laborvytnovement of New York is to be congratulated upon the opening of two important institutions within the past few days...
...Tell us that we would run the government in the interest of a class...
...Those who had associated with him closely enough to know, the essential goodness of the man may feel that his friendship was a thing too intimately fine to be written about...
...JHe was not seeking emotional thrills, any more than he was seeking personal glory...
...ARTHUR GLEASON MUCH less than justice has been done by the press, and particularly by the Radical and Labor press, to the I memory of" Arthur Gleason, the news of whose sudden and all too early death broke tn on the pleasures of holiday week...
...These facts form the rosy background of the origin of capital in the United States...
...We Socialists have paid the price of our scientific perspective...
...The Grand Duke Cyril," said Boris, vtook upon himself the guardianship of the Imperial Throne because he deemed it his duty, and cannot relieve himself of his burden.'' We will relieve Cyril of his "burden" if he can tell us where in the scrap pile the Russian throne can be found...
...that refused to accept the coin of the statesmen of capital-1 ism and in the post-war period proved that it was counterfeit...
...that finds its justification in forecasts that were verified when many foreign offices yielded up their dirty secrets...
...Above the mass of workers the struggle is over the plunder extracted from labor power.' These struggles are being fought out in terms of politics, government, and law, as well as in war and diplomacy, trustification and concessionhunting, and in strikes, lockouts, and the achievements of the unions of Labor...
...We observe them now as the most incorrigible of petty opportunists, ready to support any "progressive" third party that will permit them to crawl in at the back door...
...Either they should ignore it entirely or follow a course that has often served them in earning their weekly stipends...
...It is folklore, one of those pleasant tale* invented by the old economists to a o < count for the m . umulation of capital in tlie hands of one class while another class labors to increase that capital for the greater glory' of its owners...
...But we have had ho illusions...
...He saw the working class as it is, with all its weakness and all its strength, and he respected it and believed in it—which few of its "friends" really do...
...This was "epoch-making...
...He placed all the facilities of the State at their disposal and entertained them royally before they plunged into the wilderness...
...The capitalist nations of the world have entered upon a career of drunken, imperialism...
...It is an internationaflr* 4JKrement, as international as capitalism itself and represents the intelligent revolt of workers who have been emancipated from "liberalism," "progressivism" and the like...
...push himself to the front HtJt'it is a lovable fault, characteristic of big and honest men...
...As a curio it might bring enough on the market to feed a halfdozen Russian children...
...We are not ol thosr who believe that the point of View is limited when it assumes a definite classification...
...It would be an easy task to quote statements from early labor documents in this country of a distinct Socialist character years before the Communist Manifesto was written...
...It is not "liberal,' o?*radical," or "progressive...
...His work will live, so completely merged into the growing life of the Labor move^ ment that only a few will be able to say just what his contribution was...
...He would likely consider it an^'importation" from England j u s t as the British "progressive" would consider it an "importation" from Germany or France...
Vol. 1 • January 1924 • No. 1
