Socialism as it is

by William English Walling

Not only is Socialism spreading rapidly in all the unions, but along with it is spreading this new unionism. For many years the Western Federation of Miners, famous as the central figure in all the labor wars in the Rocky Mountain States, was the most powerful union in this country that was representative both of revolutionary Socialism and of revolutionary unionism. But it was not a part of the American Federation of Labor. When it became closely united with the Coal Miners, and the latter union forced its admission into the American Federation of Labor (in 1911), it at once began a campaign for its principles inside this organization. It now stands for two proposals, the first of which would solidly unite all the unions, and the second of which would cut all bonds between labor and capital. Neither is likely to be adopted this year, but both seem sure of a growing popularity and will in all probability result in some radical and effective action within a very few years.

In its Convention of July, 1911, the Western Federation of Miners decided to demand of the Federation of Labor the free exchange of membership cards among all its constituent unions. Thus the unions would preserve their autonomy, but every member would be free, when he changed his employer, to pass from one to the other without cost. The result would be that quarrels between the unions over members would lessen automatically, and also admission fees, dues, and benefits would tend towards a level. Thus all the things that keep the unions apart and prevent common action against the employer would be gradually removed, and the tendency of certain unions to ignore the interests of others reduced to a minimum. The plan is practical, because it has already been in successful operation for many years in France.

Another new policy—which should be regarded as a supplementary means for bringing about the same result—would be to so strengthen and democratize the general Federation as to allow great power to be placed in the hands of the executive, and at the same time subject it to the direct control of the combined rank and file of all the unions. If, for example, national Federation officials were elected, instructed, and recalled by a vote of all the unionists in the country, the latter would probably be willing to place in the hands of such an executive power to call out the unions in strike in such combinations as would make the resistance of employers most difficult, and power to control national strike funds collected from all the unions for these contests. Unions with a specially strong strategic situation in industry and a favored situation in the Federation are not yet ready to forego their privileges for this form of direct democracy, but the tendency is in this direction. (Since these lines were first written the Federation has taken steps towards the adoption of this plan of direct election of its officials by national referendum.)

Indeed, when the Western Miners' second proposal, the refusal to sign agreements for any fixed period, is adopted, this simultaneous centralization and democratization of the Federation may proceed apace. As long as the various unions are bound to the employers by an entirely separate and independent agreement terminable at different dates, it is impossible to arrange strikes in common, especially when the more fortunate unions adopt an entirely different plan of organization and an entirely different policy from the rest. The Western Miners now propose that all agreements be done away with, a practice they had followed long and successfully themselves—with the single tacit exception of the employees of the Smelter Trust (Guggenheim's). This exception they have now done away with. Their fundamental idea is that as long as the capitalist reserves his right to close down his works whenever he believes his interests or those of capital require it, every union should reserve its right to stop work at any moment when the interests of the union or of labor require it. Temporary arrangements are entered into which are binding as to all other matters except the cessation of work. That this cessation would not occur in any well-organized union over trifles goes without saying—strikes are tremendously costly to labor. The agreement binds in a way perfectly familiar to the business world in the call loan or the tenancy at will.

President Moyer of the Western Federation (one of those Mr. Roosevelt called an "undesirable citizen" at the time when he was on trial in Idaho, accused of being an accomplice in the murder of Governor Steunenburg) explained that his union knew that agreements might bring certain momentary advantages which it would otherwise lose, that it had often been in a position to win higher wages through an agreement, and in three cases even to gain a seven-hour day. But by such action, he declared the union would have surrendered its freedom. It would have been tied hand and foot, whereas now it was free to fight whenever it wanted to. If working people want to be united and effective, he concluded, they must have the fullest freedom of action. This would always pay in the end.

In view of the great advance in the organization and fighting spirit of labor secured by this new kind of industrial warfare, some revolutionary unionists even expect it to do more to bring about Socialism than the Socialist parties themselves. Indeed, a few have gone so far as to regard these parties as almost superfluous. Many of the new revolutionary unionists, though Socialists by conviction, attach so little importance to political action that they have formed no connection with the Socialist parties, and do not propose to do so. Others feel the necessity of some political support, and contend that any kind of an exclusively labor union party, even if it represents anti-revolutionary unions like most of those of the Federation of Labor, would serve this purpose better than the Socialist Party, which belongs less exclusively to the unionists.

An American revolutionary unionist and Socialist, the late Louis Duchez, like many of his school, not only placed his faith chiefly in the unskilled workers, either excluding the skilled manual laborers and the brain workers, or relegating them to a secondary position, but wanted the new organizations to rely almost entirely on their economic efforts and entirely to subordinate political action. The hours of labor are to be reduced, child labor is to be abolished, and everything is to be done that will tend to diminish competition between one workingman and another, he argued, with the idea of securing early control of the labor market. Through labor's restriction of output, production is to be cut down and the unemployed are to be absorbed. Thus, he declared, "a partial expropriation of capital is taking place" and "this constructive program is followed until the workers get all they produce."[259]

Here is an invaluable insight into the underlying standpoint of some of these anti-political "syndicalists," to use a term that has come to us from France. Nothing could possibly be more alien to the whole spirit of revolutionary Socialism than these conclusions. The very reason for the existence of Socialism is that Socialists believe that the unions cannot control the labor market in present society. The Socialists' chief hope, moreover, is that economic evolution will make possible and almost inevitable the transformation of a capitalist into a Socialist society; it is then to their interest not to retard the development of industry by the restriction of output, but to advance it. Indeed, Mr. Duchez's philosophy is not that of Socialist labor unionism, but of anarchist labor unionism, and there have been strong tendencies in many countries, not only in France and Italy, but also in the United States, especially among the more conservative unions, to be guided by such a policy. It is the essence of Mr. Gompers's program, as I have shown, to claim that "a partial expropriation of capital" is taking place through the unions, and that by this means, without any government action, and without any revolutionary general strike the workers will gradually "get all they produce." According to the Socialist view, such a gradual expropriation can only begin after a political and economic revolution, or when, on its near approach, capitalists prefer to make vital concessions rather than to engage in such a conflict.

The leading Socialist monthly in America, the International Socialist Review, which has indorsed the new unionism, has even found it necessary recently to remind its readers that the Socialist Party does after all play a certain rôle and a more or less important one, in the revolutionary movement. "Representative revolutionary unionists, like Lagardelle of France and Tom Mann of Australia," said the Review, "point out the immense value of a political party as an auxiliary to the unions. A revolutionary union without the backing of a revolutionary party will be tied up by injunctions. Its officers will be kidnapped. Its members, if they defy the courts, will be corralled in bull pens or mowed down by Gatling guns.

"A revolutionary party, on the other hand, if it pins its hopes mainly to the passing of laws, tends always to degenerate into a reform party. Its 'leaders' become hungry for office and eager for votes, even if the votes must be secured by concessions to the middle class. In the pursuit of such votes it wastes its propaganda on immediate demands."