"Justifying the general strike as an emergency weapon, Mr. Hillquit made this startling statement interpreted in some quarters as an open threat:
"'The workers of this country have the right "to call a general strike" and it is well that they should at least hold it in abeyance as a possible instrument in some cases, in very exceptional emergencies. I will say that the general strike has been used abroad for the purpose of enforcing political action.'
"'A labor party is being formed,' Mr. Hillquit said, 'in some parts of the country. Suppose it should elect representatives to the Legislature and a capitalist in that Legislature should get up and say "I don't approve of your programme; get out of my Legislature."
"'I say this would be eminently a case where the workers would be justified in declaring a general strike until such time as their constitutional rights are actually accorded to them.'"
To this "veiled threat" Martin Conboy, counsel for the Judiciary Committee, replied the next day in summing up for the prosecution. We quote his words from the "Sun and New York Herald" of March 5, 1920:
"'Under the veil of a simile a threat was employed that if you gentlemen concluded that these five Socialist Assemblymen should not sit in this chamber as members of this Assembly a general strike might be called. In the whole history devoted to the development of this idea there has been no more frank exposition of the doctrine than that. It is proof, sufficient and satisfactory to the point of a demonstration of the charge that has been made in this case.
"'The threat carries itself further. You must not only admit them, but you must take their legislative programme and exact it into law; otherwise the general strike will again be employed.
"'No opportunity is lost by the leaders of the Socialist Party to impress upon the rank and file that it is impossible to achieve ultimate triumph by political action. For this reason the American Federation of Labor is subjected to continuous attacks and misrepresentation. For this reason Debs, originally an ardent trade unionist, abandoned and repudiated his former associates after joining the Socialist Party.'"
The hypocritical defense made by the Socialists at Albany, through which the unchanged character of the unrepentant plotters has constantly revealed itself, should put us on our guard. Brought into the light by wholesale arrests and deportations, all branches of radicalism, in this country and at Moscow, have adopted new tactics of deception. They profess peace and a return to peaceful methods, claim the liberties which belong only to the law-abiding, and hide behind the sympathies of those who are easily taken in. Yet they justify all their misdeeds, and withdraw none of their evil principles, but rather reaffirm them, with subtlety. What does this mean? It means that the old conspirators, whose overt acts have lately crowded our law-courts, hope to fool the American people into letting them continue their propaganda unto lawlessness under a thin mask of conformity to the very laws they seek to destroy.
Although the "Red" conspiracy, as a result of government prosecution, has taken on disguises and gone under ground, it is not, thus, less virulent and dangerous, but more so. Evidence of deceit appeared in the "One Big Union Monthly" for February, 1920, to which lack of space prevents more than a mere allusion. That issue contained articles showing even the I. W. W. preparing an alibi and a disguise. They argued that their organization was not "illegal," and that its famous Preamble meant "evolution" and not "revolution." Another article urged the I. W. W. to give up its name and amalgamate with other industrial unions in a new organization to be known as The One Big Union.
Still more significant, the same magazine for February, 1920, published a new incitement to revolution by Leon Trotzky, together with a "Call for Proletarian International" signed by "The Bureau of the Central All-Russian Council of Industrial Unions" and an "Appeal of the Russian Industrial Unions to the Workers of the Allied Countries" signed by "The Bureau of the All-Russian Council of Industrial Union." The "call" reads:
"The Central All-Russian Council of Industrial Unions invites all economic organizations based on the real and revolutionary class struggle for the liberation of labor through the proletarian dictatorship to solidify anew their ranks against the international league of brigands, to break with the international of conciliators, and to proceed in unison with the Central All-Russian Council of Industrial Unions toward the organization of a truly international conference of all Socialistic labor unions and veritable revolutionary workers' syndicates.
"We beg all economic labor organizations that accept the program of the revolutionary class struggle to respond to our call and enter in a direct touch with us."
The accompanying I. W. W. comment was, "We are sure that our organization will be there." Thus, if it be under ground, the mole still works. Moscow still inflames, unifies and directs the great world-conspiracy against the "Entente Powers" and all the nations that have been looking toward peace. The "Appeal," accompanying the "call," says in part:
"Can it be true, that you, the workers of England, France, Italy and the United States, will much longer support your governments and permit your blood to quench the spreading conflagration of the social revolution? Can it be that the international bandits of the League of Nations and the thrice-branded Versailles shall be allowed unhampered to weave their nets for the strangling of the world proletarian revolution?...
"Down with the bandits of imperialism!
"Long live the World Proletarian Revolution!
"Long live the International Soviet Republic!"
Near the end of his article Trotzky says, according to "The One Big Union Monthly," for February, 1920, page 21, "By thrusting the bourgeoisie away from the helm of state, by taking power into its own hands, the working class is preparing for the creation of Federation of Soviet Republics of Europe and the whole world.... War was and will remain a form of armed exploitation or armed struggle against exploitation."