TWO SCHOOLS OF SOCIALIST THOUGHT
Cahan, Abraham
TWO SCHOOLS OF SOCIALIST THOUGH Cahan Sees Modern Socialism Rejecting Orthodoxy; Trade Unionism and The Political Parties This is the llnrd of 4 seriej of articles written for The A'rtc Leader...
...The at- I tltude of the new government win also be determined by those two circumstances...
...bile Co...
...The other political prisoners are still languishing in prison...
...But the new regime, through its suspension of political freedom of action is already proving strongly antagonistic to the Interests of the worker...
...The leaders et the walkout were not ditrrlmtotttt against, although ft was thought that they had been to touch with the lotktj out full fashioned hosiery workers at t* Allen-A Co...
...socially, it was a struggle for control over the public services and a claim on the state treasury...
...Yugoslavia too had Its part in this great historical re-birth...
...To-day this factional division is a thing of the past...
...the Croats were under Hungarian domination, the Slovenes and Dalmatians under that of Austria, Bosnia under a special mixed Austrian and Hungarian administration...
...nevertheless it is this class which now has to suffer from the system produced by the disputes...
...When under modern conditions, with new Inventions and discoveries coming along every day, the union "cooperates" to make Industry more efficient, It is very likeiy^cooperating to put some of its own members on the street, machines replacing them, to Increase the number of idle hands for whom It Is difficult to find jobs anywhere, to make it harder for men over forty to find work...
...Reactionary plant are said to be cherished by the capitalists to use the...
...The union, on the other hand, polices the individual worker, who under the stress of the struggle for existence, is likewise constantly tempted to break down the standards that have been achieved, to work overtime, for example, to take less pay In order to get s job temporarily, and so on...
...Today, ten years after the foundation of the state, each province bat a different penal and civil code...
...Under modern conditions new problems emerge for the union...
...The pert played by August Bebel, the jrreat leader of the party, in these conflicts was characteristic...
...As these pardons are individual in character, to many of the prisons the political prisoners have gone on hunger strikes with the demand for a general political amnesty...
...This, however, requires much more effective action on the part of union* in the field of legislation and government generally, and raises the important question as to whether the union at an agency of social control is not bound to be Inadequate, to break down unless It Is supplemented by a labor party as an additional agency of social control...
...Thus the dictatorship encountered not the least resistance either at the hands of the racial or of the bourgeote parties...
...later, when the Social Democracy of Germany went into Reichstag elections, it did so distinctly and solely as a means of "revolutionary propaganda...
...All over the world this tendency on the part of the union to assume responsibility for the productive process is in evidence...
...Serbia and Montenegro were independent powers...
...In the course of the dev- elopment of the economic life of Yugoslavia from peasant industry and handicraft to a powerful capitalist regime their position Is only slowly gaining In strength...
...They were all loyal—both groups—were loyal members of the party and as such many of them were members of the Reichstag...
...When the political confusion of the country Increased as it did after the murder in the Belgrade Parliament and the secession of the Croats, their hour drew near...
...SdRor, The New Leader.' Labor's New Functions Changing Industry And Changing Policies By A. J. Muste IN its earliest stage trade unionism was a spontaneous gesture on the part of the workers striking back at the degradation of their material and spiritual standards which were effected or threatened when the old agricultural economy broke up and the workers were herded into cities and factories...
...Furthermore, it may well be the only agency, or at least one of the Important agencies able to look at the Industry as a whole and to envisage it as a means by which society provides itself with certain services rather than as a means of profit and exploitation for an individual...
...This mean* that increasing attention must be given to ear naval and military establishment...
...BELGIAN CANDIDATES CHOSEN Brussels,—The Brussels Federation et the Belgian Labor Party has chosen tat candidates of the Party for the con-tag elections for the Chamber and the estate...
...A number of readers haze written in comment on Comrade Cohan's articles...
...In the first place, the union has in the past been for the worker an agency of democracy, of self-expression, a human thing, something that took him away from the drive of industry, something that stood over against industry and it* owners, something that fought for him and for which he fought...
...At for Labor, Instead of degenerating into a bmion of starving waifs, it, too, hat made notable progress, achieving important political and economic triumphs...
...German Social ism was parachuting down to earth...
...The President of France, M. Doumergue has issued an amnesty for those sentenced by military tribunals...
...provided latitude enough for practical "revisionist" usage...
...No hand was raised to defence of popular rights, not even a voice of protest made Itself heard against the overthrow of the parliamentary system...
...The king himself had for years pursued a policy calculated to weaken the bouregois parties one after another and lead to their internal disruption...
...The self-governing workshop has been a failure wherever trial practically...
...Vandervelde, to accordance wrth t special resolution of the Federation, ear not included in this vote, and he stank at the head of the list for the Chamber...
...In each party he was able to find politician* without character Intent only on a career, led by ambition...
...We may cite three by way of illustration...
...In Yugoslavia itself, however, the new regime and the abolition of Parliament have come as a not altogether unexpected event to large mi met of the people...
...Ok Betsrday the crank shaft department wafetf out to protest against the new gang tjK tern of wage #ay...
...They did not protest against the dissolution of thsir partita...
...to the last 10 months ItttSWlM a fourth victory for the men...
...From the most extremely radical to the most conservative and reactionary trade union leaders, the same cry of a drop in union morale, lack of interest In union meetings, etc., is beard...
...The formula is a nutshell summary of Marx's attitude toward the labor movement...
...In the third place, to an increasing extent, the surplus produce by our highly developed industrialism and not returned to the mi tin of the consumers, goes into investments abroad...
...The country is predominantly agricultural, and the industrial workers form a minority of some 600,000 In a population of 13 millions...
...the General Council of the Trade nions would become the central planniBj board for Soviet industry...
...It is interesting to note that even Mat* solini has not dared altogether to eV pense with the unions in his Fttebt scheme of Industry...
...There comes a time when certain standards are established in an industry...
...One welcomed it as pretext for whetting labor's class hostility, as a sort of military drill preparatory to the great final battle that is to wipe out the capitalis system...
...Discipline breaks down when the person who does the disciplining h too immediately dependent for his job upon those who are to be disrlpHiad There must be an agency for planatai and controlling the industrial proses standing apart from the men in a particular shop...
...The building up again of the Socialist labor movement, an extremely difficult matter but partially successful, has now received a sudden interruption by the establishment of the dictatorship...
...It polices the employer, on the one hand, who under the stress of competition is constantly tempted to depart from the standards that have been set...
...It becomes an industrial and social engineer perhaps rather than a policeman...
...The working-man's strivings for more pay and shorter hours is...
...t* the state...
...Socialists were able to render the working people a good deal of substantial service and, as a reward, to enjoy their confidence and attention...
...They suggest the necessity of developing in this country a system "of social insurance against old age, unemployment, death, etc...
...Since the above waa written all workers* associations in Yugoslavia of a SocialDemocratic or Communist tendency, including cultural associations, have been dissolved and the meeting-places of the associations have been closed...
...The prophesy is supposed to be the/ culminating stage in a profound scientific study of facts and figures...
...It took courage as well as vision to arrive at and publish his farreaching argument and conclusions, for be was a German and one of the best known members of the SocialDemocracy...
...Socialists, however, in Europe at least, have practically abandoned it...
...At the other extreme, there were those who held that the trade union was to be the sole instrument a production...
...Toward the end of the nineteenth century the industries of that country took a spurt and...
...d it came home to its leaders that unless one fused an alloy of practical benefit with the gold of revolutionary idealism, the noble oietal would fatally lack consistence...
...of their families all tcrtt cf cultural, recreational and educational activities in a spontaneous, democratic fashion...
...And if this savored of "palllatlvism...
...and hence a better revolutionist, of the wage-worker, whereas your penniless, homeless wretch has too little self respect to be useful and dependable as fighting material...
...I found a number of surprises, one of them being a peculiar situation among the active men of the Social Democracy, then already the largest party in the Reichstag...
...In Russia where industry had to be rebuilt after the revolution, three conceptions as to the function of the trade onion in the new regime were advance...
...The more "radical" members branded them as traitors, seceded and Joined the anarchists, while the "right wingers," as we should call them to-day, pleaded the opportunity which parliament afforded them to expose and assail the enemy, and thus to inflame the revolutionary fighting, blood of the proletariat...
...A parliament was "a committee of capital...
...Now, since the Great Change is a* near at band, where is the sense in bothering about such trifles as better wages or old age pensions...
...It it true that at present the Yugoslavian dictatorship Is not Fascist to character...
...Hence the "revolutionary character" of the trade union and parliamentary activities of BoeJabstt...
...Its social systems, the crimes of Capitalism and the moral and economic superiority of what you describe to him under the head of Socialism...
...On Monday tba...
...The coup d'etat was carried out without any use of feres, and the new regime bat not yet 'found it necessary to behave with any particular brutality...
...Still, one cannot live on principles alone...
...ftut result of an this has now made Okelf clear...
...Obviously, in thus neliclng industry, the union very definitely acts as an agency of social control on behalf of...
...Lenin took an intermediate position which was adopted, namely, thai unions as such were not equipped, not m constituted, that they could manage industry directly...
...Possibly the "Strong mind in a strong body" idea was sounder than the main doctrine which it meant to patch up...
...new regime for their own ends and to destroy the small amount of legislation for the protection of the workers which exists, but so far they have taken no practical farm...
...Had it not been for their mistaken revolutionary view of the labor movement, however, they might have done a great deal more for the masses and their success would have been more rapid • • • When Edward Bernstein, sometimes called the Luther of the Marxian Movement, challenged Marx's prophesy as to the approaching downfall of capitalism, it involved a radical reversal of the party's entire policy, its desseanor in the unions and in parliament included...
...The coup d'etat had been prepared' well to advance...
...Old Pasic, the Bismarck of Serbia, the founder of Yugoslavia unity, was "dropped" by the king and harried into his grave...
...The event has filled the workers of all countries with anxiety and cheered the hearts of the reactionaries...
...Under such a regime, the worker as an employe, it was argued, has no need of any organization to protect himself against hnntetf as an employer...
...On the other hand, the loan negotiations which have been going' on for some time, and the concessions to the field of foreign policy which they brought with them, have also been a die-' turbing element in the country...
...Now, what was the situation in Germany during the period in question...
...The Implacable racial disputes, the everlasting governmental crisis, the big corruption scandals in which party after party became Involved, led to a weakening of all democratic forces, a strengthening and a growing independence of the power of the states...
...It was all part and parceVuf the coming social revolution...
...Tot bourgeois press of all political shades Immediately and-without exception accepted the new order, and a portion of the bourgeoisie greeted it with entbuittem The Croats toe, to a short-sighted spirit of racial separatism acclaimed with joy the fall of the bated constitution and weleatned the intervention of the king...
...Then the union is called upon to assume, or at least likely to assume, a more positive attitude toward the problems of Industry and production...
...It was owing to its revolutionary interpretation of the labor movement that it was never able to get a hearing among tradeunionists in the very country from whose economic history Marx had deduced his subtle theory...
...First, there were those who held thai there was no need of unions, the worked' state being now the employer...
...and which aroused in him all the passionate loyalty that human beings give to institutions and organizations under those conditions When now the union Itself becomes a part of the industry, when it develops business methods and a business atmosphere, when it becomes highly respectable, when instead of telling- him that his interests as a human being are first and that if they are looked after, the industry will prosper, the union tells him that it is necessary to see to it that the Industry prospers and if this happens his interests as a human being will be taken care of, a great psychological change is bound to occur...
...Relations With Other Countries One other question at once occurs to the foreign observer: What is the attitude of the new regime in Yugoslavia to other countries...
...Speeded up in recent months they demanded an Increase in wages from 60 to 07Vic...
...Tie labor movement must similarly lien— international...
...These lnvettoWBb must be "protected...
...The strike declared by a trade union is important, chiefly, as one of a series of preliminary skirmishes of the Social Revolution...
...he drew such men to him, played them "off against the old party leaders, made them ministers and his own confidential ser- . vants...
...national freedom and unification in an independent state...
...TJnder rah circumstances, abandoned to the arbitjty despotism of officials who have It in tfetir power to choke It out of existence from one dap to another, the labor movement to Yugoslavia has to maintain its tanstenot as best It may...
...In his place mediocrities willing to be the king's pawns, such as Vuklcevlc and Usunovlc, rose from the radical ranks to a place in the government...
...The Situation of the Workers The workers of Yugoslavia, however, . much they may be opposed In principle of the new state of things, are in practice too weak to take up the struggle against the dictatorship with revolutionary weapons...
...I used to wonder whether the argument was not st variance with that part of Marx's prophecy which depicted Capital's Day of Judgment as the revolt of a starved and degraded multitude, but the discrepancy seemed to be a negligible minor point...
...Any concrete advantage that might have been gained for labor through parliament was pooh-poohed as a palliative" (a staple In the vocabulary of Marxism Socialists), tending to blunt class resentment and hence harmful to our cause...
...e I happened to visit Berlin In 1912, after an absence of nineteen years...
...I discovered a quiet, yet pronounced split in their ranks, the dividing line running between "orthodox Marxians" and "revisionists" (or "Bernsteinftes...
...Politically the conflict turned on the question whether the constitution should be centralized or federal...
...The days of the existing economic, arrangement were in his judgment numbered...
...an hour...
...The So* etanst Party of Yugoslavia hat thus become illegal...
...The immediate response they received and the .rapid headway which their party made was as natural as the stagnation of the Hyndman movement...
...We enter upon a career of imperialism tat militarism...
...The "VoJksstlmme," published to Oar...
...These u-ilt be printed after he has concluded his...
...the land reform movement has made itself felt as a life-giving force in the social organism, bringing the peasants as a conscious and active class to play their part on the political stage, whilst the democratic form of government has made its triumphal entry over half Europe...
...in the light of his doctrine, a minor phase in the struggle, a mere adjunct...
...the trade union* continue to exist for the present, only Communist trade union* be* tog forbidden by law (tins bat long been the ease as retards «** Communist Party...
...Anyhow, thanks to that extra bit of dogma...
...There can be no doubt that the tension of the relations with Italy, which have for a long time been strained almost to the point of war, has strengthened the power of the military In Yugoslavia...
...The upshot was a aeries of changes, all m the "right" direction, to the mental make-up of her Social...
...The matter is not so simple however...
...as a natural consequence, her trade unions developed with a sbnilar tempo...
...The agent* of the king within the various parties, Marinkovlcs, Usunovlc, Korotee, who had all repeatedly sworn allegeance to the Constitution became Ministers of the Government which bad been called into office after the abrogation of that Constitution...
...The Forces at Work The recent events to Yugoslavia are but an act in the great historical drama whose stage Is but a corner of a greater theatre...
...This view of labor's struggle would be particularly stressed by Socialists as members at parliament...
...It could not be anything else...
...If It is to earn- out its funeUon of social control...
...What Impressed me as the most Interesting and instructive part of the schism was the fact that nearly all the important "revisionists" happened to be actively connected with the trade unions while their opponents were out of touch with the realities of the economic struggle...
...The same game was played in the democratic, party, where the old party leader Devidovtc was replaced by the clever politicians Marinkovlcs and Ninclc...
...The English wage-earner whom Hyndman and his followers sought to reach cared nothing for their doctrinaire dissertations on class antagonism and revolution...
...Socialists essentially of a Fabian turn of mind, but close to the trade unions, to launch an active educational campaign in the ranks of labor...
...His "heresy" was fought most bitterly in the course of a considerable period, but it gradually won complete acceptance...
...in other words, that material well-being makes a better man...
...The fight is the thing...
...The awakening of these peoples fills the whole of the last quarter Of the nineteenth century...
...It is still in the saddle and more powerful than ever...
...it happened that the victory fell to neither side, but to a third party...
...I have referred to the failure of Hyndman's Social Democratic Federation of England, a rigorously Marxian body...
...all other parties mutt be approved by the police...
...CARDERS STRIKE FOB PAT WOONSOCKET, R! L—(FP)—When carders walked out tfje carding and spinning rooms of the River Mills shut down...
...They may be far from perfect, but there is some point beyond which wages are not permitted to fall, some limit to the hours that may be worked, some age below which children will not be employed In that stage the union may be said to serve as a policeman...
...The Southern Slavs had been divided, until the, war, amongst six different states...
...But then their organization was chiefly made up of intellectuals with but little contact with working people...
...In the face of a discredited Parliament power passed more and more into the hands of the beaurocracy and the generals, who found their directing spirit in the ambitious policy of the king.1*" The more the national, religious and social groups and parties became involved In these quarrels, the greater became the influence of the Court Party, the more despotic grew the rule of the "Whit* Hand," the clique of officers and court officials, the more completely did the monarchy, with lis basis of military support dominate the bourgeois classes and parties...
...The coup d'etat found the political parties incapable of resistance...
...Partial Chrwtmas and New Year Amnesties Paris—Vice-Regent Worthy of Hungary issued at Christmas pardons to 3AS offenders...
...The working-class of Yugoslavia has always taken the view that the struggle of the various races and the bourgeois parties for the Constitution and the establishment of a bourgeois State was not their affair...
...Wis.—(FP)—The Jost«| spasmodic walkout in the Nash Antes...
...So for followers of our cause to taint their lungs by breathing its air was treason to themselves as well as to the working class...
...While Its military policy will develop more I freely than ever, it* financial policy will make It more dependent than before on the good-will of those foreign countries which, hold the purse strings, may therefore be expected that there will be strong military preparations, coupled with a for- 1 eign policy dictated by the need for loans, and that the dictatorship will probably fee prepared to continue the negotiations with Italy and to make certain concession*, and some successes in the field of foreign policy are an urgent necessity for the enhancement of Its prestige at home and abroad...
...Her concept of the labor movement, primarily at an army drilling for the social revolution was gradually giving way to a point of view the sum and tubstance of which was the prosaic old rule that a bird to band is worth two in the bush...
...the noted editor of the Jewish Daily Foruord, one of the largest Socialist dailies in the world...
...As was mentioned in a previous article of this series, his "revisionism" was combated most Utterly, bat if Marx had adduced figures and facts in support of bis prediction, so did Bernstein by way of making good bis challenge...
...to the intellectual bent of the German mind...
...He was gifted with too much common sense, however, not to perceive the practical tide of a problem and, to reconcile the two distinct impulses in his own self as well as the two opposing trends in the party, he would in many instances, seek a formula which, while theoretically "orthodox...
...Their overthrow brought with It In the East of Europe the triumph of the bourgeois revolution in its three main lines of development...
...On the ruins of the three imperial states new national states have everywhere arisen...
...It was a matter of time—no more than a few years perhaps—when it would collapse...
...man to Maribor, has issued an appeal of the Executive of the Peasants Group of the Socialist Party for Slovenia, which concludes: i "Whilst caning the attention of the members of the Party to the new conditions we appeal to them to remain loyal to the fine tradition* of Socialism, and to retain, to these diffcult days, a firm faith to a brighter future...
...The urge of these peoples towards freedom, confined as they were in the shackles of the three great half-feudal military monarchies, Russia, Austria-Hungary and Germany, became an explosive whose effects finally overthrew these great powers in the World War...
...It would carry on Industry ltse}f...
...Yugoslavia Goes Fascist Fermentation Begun During War for Democracy Brings South-Eastern Europe a New Dictatorship By Oscar Pollak '2'tut coup d'etat in Yugoslavia has added a new victim to the ranks of those lands deprived of the light of democracy which now stretch like a black band across Eastern and South Eastern Europe...
...An Agency of Social Control Turning to the function of trade unlets as agencies of social control in the cooperative commonwealth, it seems to w that all the signs we have point to the probability that in a socialized order tries unions will continue to function for t long time to come, and that their runcuec will not be that which is envisaged by the syndicalists, for example, namely, at amlog as voluntary democratic agenda winch themselves carry on the productive process, the men in the f hoi* electlm their own bosses, but that production will be managed directly through an agency that coordinates industry as a whole, tbtt has on it representatives of workers, experts and consumers, while the twice* representing workers as workers serve u an agency through which they may resist tyranny In the shop, may Insist on the consideration of the human factor b working out plans and budgets, setttng rates on wages, hours of work...
...Communists now use the Dhrase with more gusto than ever...
...Also, Germany was an ironclad monarchy, with free speech and real representative government still to be won...
...It It necessary that the international labor movement,' If it is to judge the situation in Yugoslavia- "idght, and influence it as far a* thatjnay be possible, should take into account these two point*—the Increased danger of war, which every dictatorship carries with it, because of its removal of the check which democracy provides, and the need of the new Government for peace, which is to turn a consequence of its need for money...
...Obviously in the modem world such development as this cannot be, checked or controlled in the interest et the masses of the people by means of rational trade unions even If they are supplemented by a national labor pat*/, Capitalism becomes international...
...Nearly three quarters of a century have passed since Karl Marx has announced the almost im—«»>« death of Capital...
...Kenosha Nash Workers *J Win Another WalkaH KENOSHA...
...the community as a whole...
...It is their basis for all they are trying to do in Russia, for their Third International which has been such a curse to themselves as well as to the labor movement In many countries and, it is one of the chief causes of the tragic tailors of their entire experiment...
...Indeed, it was some time before our movement in Europe came to deem it proper for Socialists to have desks under the same roof as deputies of the pesaesslng class...
...No decision has yet been taken at to whether the Socialist Party is to be tolerated...
...The lack of education amongst them made them favorable soil for the Communist movement, which dominated the country from UlS'te 1*24, producing general devastation and leaving ruin behind It...
...Democracy...
...In general...
...The spirit of absolutism triumphs through the absence of any opposing force...
...As the movement progress...
...one's revolutionary conscience was lubricated by a -special little theory according to which a well-nourished body' shelters a vigorous class-conscious spirit...
...In that primitive stage the union was a' fighting Instrument and chiefly negative in its effect...
...But then the world war shook up European Capital pretty badly for a year or two, to the Bolshevik...
...Trade Unionism and The Political Parties This is the llnrd of 4 seriej of articles written for The A'rtc Leader by Abraham Cahan...
...the agrarian revolution...
...The Bulgarian Government has issued amnesties to 109 offenders, of whom SO were in prison for political offences...
...The Fabian Societr, an anti-Marxian Socialist organization founded by Sidney Webb and Bernard Shaw in the nineties, was interested in whatever good one might be able to do, not by way of accelerating the advent of a social upheaval, but for the pure and simple purpose of remedying some of the existing social evils...
...By Abraham Cahan LASS-CONSCIOUS and revolution^ ary"—this Is the way we were wont to describe the trade unions of which the Socialist party approved...
...It aroused but little attention In the great world, and was accomplished apart from the life of the West, but its effects were felt throughout the entire East...
...The small-peasant element which is pouring into the towns adds to the ranks of the workers, but It takes time for them to be absorbed and edu- cated...
...The German Socialist gartj, in its early stages, appealed to popular sympathy by the crusade it led for political emancipation...
...Macedonia was subject to Turkey.- This meant not only tlx different systems of law, but at the same time Tit reaching differences to economic and cultural life and development...
...But In Yugoslavia there immediately appeared—as...
...series...
...Differences of opinion were many and not infrequently they were quite pronounced, but they were usually adjusted and general devotion to the party was maintained...
...It is the drama of the national revolution of the Slav, Baltic and Balkan peoples...
...maf share in the determination of the general policies of industry, and may carry on lor the member...
...An Agency of Democracy Prom the standpoint of the outside observer, all this may seem like a very natural and wholesome development which ought to lead by gradual and yet swift stages to a regime of socialized industry...
...Their swash-buckling nationalism, with its radical potaattttSt and elalsas, turned out to be embued rather with the spirit of demagogy than of true democracy...
...The bourgeois revolution, incapable of giving to the country a strong and settled constitution, sees its work and Its historical task to pass into the bands of a government of generals, into the iron grasp of a military dictatorship...
...According to the dtcittt which ushered to the coup d'etat, political parties which have a national or religious basis, at alto those whose activity is directed against the existing government (and under this heading comes any pronouncement in favor of the parliamentary principle) are forbidden to exist...
...There follows a third period when the union is firmly established and is accepted as a permanent factor in industry...
...The Court Party became a group not outside, but, what it1 much more dangerous, within the other parties...
...in differing degrees, in all the other new states—the problems of this new development...
...the fall of the feudal system and its replacement by a system of Parliamentary democracy...
...As a consequence, It was left to the Independent Labor Party...
...Beat} the justification for a trade union organization carrying out the functions abow indicated...
...An open breach did not teem likely...
...But in this fierce struggle, which paralysed the Parliament and ate like dry rot into all the new institutions of the state...
...The Political Situation That is the historical significance of the present events to Yugoslavia—an absolute regime In endeavoring to complete the half finished edifice which the bourgeois state'was powerless to finish...
...The new law tor the "Protection of Public Security and Order" provides for death or Imprisonment for twenty years, of "any person, who associates himself with persons or associations to other countries for the purpose of staking support for a revolution or for the forcible alteration of tba prat tat political situation to the country...
...The stiff fight put us If* the Allen-A workers has put new spsK into the Nash employes...
...The revolutionary view of the labor movement under consideration is Marx's corollary of his forecast as to the near future of capitalism...
...The generals and police sergeants who are now masters of the country understand nothing of economic policy and are for the moment concerned with other matters...
...The coup d'etat put the power into their hands to make order in their own fashion...
...A strike was to him nothing more or less than a means of making his employer nay him more wages...
...It is occurring in unions everywhere today...
...made use of that situation to revamp the "approaching doom" theory and to try to build an allembracing Socialist system to order...
...Such problems as these the individual union cannot possibly meet...
...It has promised to solve the question of the constitution, to reform the administration, and to proceed to the unification of the law in the different districts...
...Of these, six had been sentenced for political offences connected with the press, and two for offences against the dictatorship of the Council...
...Furthermore, It would to all Intents and purpose...
...Altogether it struck In the heart of the German toiler' chords which had little to do with his material interests...
...An ardent Marxist and revolutionary all his life, he usually supported the "Orthodox" faction...
...But on the other has* Lenin asserted, there It no reason to totok that the state or some central planobf board for Soviet Industry may not alt* kt tyrannical In It* attitude toward the workers as Individuals or in groups...
...What he would have been willing to lend an ear to was the voice of a social and political movement that would offer to lighten his burden In some tangible way...
...In addition.to an this came differences of religion and alphabet It became tocreestogly clear that the unification of these varying degewes at culture could only be carried out by a process of gradual development, and that to attempt to force them into the frame-work of a centralised constitution would be premature and lead to failure...
...Even amongst the Croats the king, with the help of Redid irresolute attitude, was able to gain a certain influence...
...Thus it came about that the first decade of the existence of the Yugoslav state was filled with the bitter quarrels of races which, although bound together in one state, had not yet become a nation, and likewise with the conflict of classes, in particular the conflict between the peasantry which liberated the landreform movement and the young capitalist bourgeoisie, struggling in the new state for power and Influence, for places for their sons and state contracts for their businesses...
...These varied from the most primitive forms of cultivation by small peasant proprietors and home craftmanthip in the mountains and towns of Macedonia to the most modern type of agriculture to Croatia and the highly developed Industry of the Lafbach district...
...If you helped him in this direction, you would^ be likely to gain his good will and then he might perhaps develop an interest in your ideas as to the world...
...ecta* party assured the men that the eyttta would not he introduced...
...to build one to a medieval peasant country...
...All cooperation with sympathisers to other countries is threatened with severe penalties, -even Including death, all liberty of aatombly to suspended, and the press it completely muszled...
...TJp to the present 181 pardons have been signed, and 337 cases are awaiting consideration...
...The theory affected their attitude toward the labor' movement in a multitude of ways that combined to render their policy unacceptable, if not unintelligible, to one unfamiliar with Marxlam dialectics In Germany Socialist propaganda was a success from the start, but this was largely due, as has been pointed out...
...The most rabid "Orthodox' in the German government oj to-day is in reality more "revisionist" than was the most pronounced follower of Bernstein of 1912 • • * » Communists profess adherence to Marx's faith in the proximity of Capital's collapse...
...He knew of all the corruption scandals—not less than seven successive Ministers of Forestry are said to have been Implicated in the great wood exportation swindle In Bosnia aneV preserved silence about them In order to keep a hold over those involved.*' Thus it came about that in the two great historical parties of Serbia, the Radicals and the Democrats, the official leaden of the party had lees say in its affairs than the groups of ministers and expectant ministers...
Vol. 8 • February 1929 • No. 5
