Communism and Christianism / Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View

by William Montgomery Brown

Since 1913, when the foregoing catechism was published, we have had the war to end war and to make the world safe for democracy—a fateful and mournful war in which millions of lives were lost and other millions wrecked with the result of multiplying wars and increasing imperialism.

It was a war between national groups of capitalists with conflicting interests for commercial advantages, which is unexpectedly issuing in three great crises: (1) the imminent bankruptcy of capitalism; (2) the communist revolution in Russia, and (3) the imminent taking over of the world by the revolutionary proletariat.

Hitherto, the sons and daughters of capitalism have owned the earth with all that thereon and therein is. Henceforth, the sons and daughters of the useful workers shall be the owners.

The future belongs to the workers, but not until they organize themselves into one big revolutionary union. What ideas and aims are involved in the faith and endeavor of Revolutionary Unionism will appear from this passage in Comrade Philip Kurinsky's Industrial Unionism and Revolution, a brilliant pamphlet, published by The Union Press, Box 205, Madison Square, New York City:

"Slavery is not abolished. It is merely a change in the struggle which throws itself hither and thither like the waves of the seas. In ancient times chattel slavery existed. Feudalism then took its place. Feudalism in its turn was overthrown by capitalism which at present reigns supreme. As the immortal Tolstoy explained, 'The abolition of the old slavery is similar to that which Tartars did to their captives. After they had cut up their heels they placed stones and sand in the wounds and then took the chains off. The Tartars were sure that when the feet of their prisoners were swollen, that they could not run away and would have to work even without chains. Such is the slavery of wages'.

Of this slavery does revolutionary unionism speak in the name of the revolutionary worker. It analyzes the present society and shows that it is divided into two economic classes. One class, the capitalist class, is the master class which controls all the factories, mills, mines, railroads, lands and fields and all the finished and raw materials. This class possesses all the natural riches of the world and this economic supremacy gives it control of the state, of the church, and of all educational institutions. In short, this class owns everything and controls the whole social and political life of each country. The other class, the working class, owns nothing. It produces all and enjoys little. It uses the machines and tools but does not possess them, and is therefore forced to sell its only possession, its labor power, to the master class. And the latter uses the opportunity to buy that wonderful power like any raw material or some other commodity (some of the representatives of craft unionism wish to deny this but unsuccessfully). For the commodity which the worker is compelled to sell in order that he might live, he receives a wage which is determined as is the price of every other commodity. The price is always smaller than the value of the product which the worker produces for the capitalist.

Between these two classes there must, naturally, exist a tremendous struggle which often has the character of actual war. No one urges the workers to this war—not the terrible I. W. W.'s nor the political socialist, neither the Bolsheviks nor the Anarchists, but the war naturally and inevitably arises from existing conditions.

On the one hand, the capitalists are continually chasing after higher profits which results in the employment of cheap labor under the worst conditions. Naturally the ideal of the capitalist class is to keep the workers in a condition of slavery. If the workers attempt to revolt, as they do daily, their masters try to suppress the revolt with all the power at their command. On the other hand, the workers struggle with all their power to lighten their burdens. They strive to get better conditions, higher wages and shorter hours, and in general the ideal of the working class is to throw off the yoke of capitalism.

No one rightfully can say that this struggle is merely a theory. We can see this struggle in the attempts of the capitalist class to destroy the victorious Russian Proletariat. It is mirrored before our eyes in the continual strikes. Nothing can stop this struggle except the abolition of exploitation.

No matter how hard the Citizens' Committees, Boards of Arbitration, of Conciliation and of Mediation, with their so-called impartial members try to convince the world that it is possible to bring the warring classes into closer relations, their attempts are doomed to failure. At best their success is only temporary and their efforts succeed only in blinding the eyes of the working masses. And if at some time these boards claim a victory, the credit is not due to them, but to the force exerted by the workers. It is the strike-weapon, held in reserve by the toilers, that brings victory to the workers—not the efforts of the philanthropic gentlemen. Furthermore the efforts of these gentlemen greatly harm the workers, for at times when the workers can attain success through the use of the strike, these philanthropists interfere, and deaden the initiative and aggressiveness of the strikers. Often this causes strife between the strikers themselves. They lose confidence in one another, and the existence of the organizations which the workers succeeded in building up through their efforts and sacrifices are jeopardized.