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committee of the Socialist Party of New York, the state in which probably half the membership of the S. L. P. is located.) We have not space for a complete review of the arguments on both sides. But Untermann's in our opinion represents the view of a scholar impatient of criticism and taking past controversies too seriously, while Stirton impresses us as a man in close touch with the vital revolutionary elements of the present hour. Only one argument offered by Comrade Untermann requires special comment. He intimates that the rank and file of the S. L. P. are ignorant of socialism as compared with the rank and file of our own party. Our own impression, based on a pretty extended acquaintance with members of both parties, is that the exact reverse is true, as should naturally be expected in view of the fact that the growth of the Socialist Party has been by far the more rapid and that it spreads over much purely agricultural territory. The average S. L. P. member, whatever unpleasant traits he may have, does usually know something of Marx, and if we could have him on the inside instead of the outside, he would be a valuable help in clearing up the ideas of new converts. With this work in hand, he would have less time left for hair-splitting, and the union of forces would thus make for general efficiency all around. Old animosities_are_of very small importance as compared with effective party work. Let us get together if we

can.

How to Get Socialist Unity. As we go to press, word comes that the National Committee of the Socialist Party has defeated Lee's motion authorizing the National Executive Committee to meet a committee of seven elected by the Socialist Labor Party to confer over terms of union. It has also adopted Berger's motion:

"That the sections and members of the Socialist Labor Party be invited to join our Party individually or in sections, and make their applications to our respective locals. All persons applying to pledge themselves as individuals to accept our Platform and our tactics."

It is hardly likely that this action will meet with any general and immediate response on the part of the Socialist Labor Party. The little band of enthusiasts who have strained their scanty resources for years to keep up their organization, for the sake of things that seemed vital to them, will naturally object to being swallowed so unceremoniously. Why not do as we did in 1900? The two parties which now make up the Socialist Party were then distinct. The rank and file for the most part wanted to get together, but the executive committees failed to agree, and a presidential campaign was on. What we did was to unite on the same candidates, elect joint local campaign committees wherever both parties were active, and get to work together. By the time the campaign was over, we were so well acquainted that the details of consolidation were easily settled with the best of feeling. The same plan ought to work in 1908. Let the Socialist Party adopt a clear-cut workingclass platform, and nominate two clear-headed workingmen for President and Vice-President. Let the Socialist Labor Party endorse the platform and candidates; then let each party, maintaining its own dues-paying organization, join in the work of propaganda and education until November, working together locally wherever possible. Then after election let us take up the question of organic unity again; it will be far easier than now.

Brains and Atmospheres. Put a first-class brain, with body and lungs to match, into an atmosphere heavily charged with carbonic acid gas, and it fails to turn out a superior article of brain work. And there are mental atmospheres as well as physical ones. Their

effects are not so speedy, but they are lasting. A brain receives impressions and draws conclusions from them according to the mental atmosphere in which it has moved. This is necessarily so. If a brain had to reason out each time from first principles an interpretation of each message of its senses, it would reach no conclusion till the time for action had gone by. Different mental atmospheres develop different types of brain. There is one of the big capitalist, one of the petty capitalist, the villager (probably Shaw is right in thinking this the commonest American type), one of the collegian and one of the wageworker in the great machine industry. The Socialist Party of America contains brains of all these types. Each has its own instinctive way of approaching a problem, and each is capable of modifying its instinctive way more or less by conscious effort. We are led to these reflections by the entertaining article from Charles Dobbs, published in this issue. We are not writing this paragraph to defend the comrade criticized; he is quite able to defend himself. What we hope to do here is to suggest a way to distinguish between the "intellectuals" who are worth having and the other kind. Of the social groups we have named over, all but one are survivals from past social stages, the city proletarian is the vital element of to-day and he comes nearer than any of us to the type which will decide how things shall be done in the near future. Hence we hold that, as a general rule, the proletarian's instinctive estimates of men and measures are more likely to be sound than those of people in the other social groups, unless these last have by persistent effort been able to modify their instinctive ways of thinking into something like the proletarian way. This we believe that Comrade Dobbs himself usually does, and so do some other college-bred men who are now active in the Socialist Party.

Unionism, Utopian and Scientific. A correspondent in our News and Views department insists on misunderstanding a signed article by the present editor of the Review which appeared in the December number. Any one who will take the trouble to refer to our article will see that we never said industrial unionism was utopian or futile. On the contrary we hold that industrial unionism is the logical outcome of recent changes in the mode of production. When commodities were mainly produced in small plants by small capitalists, craft unionism was logical and inevitable. Moreover it is always the case that ideas and institutions, like the organs of animals and plants, survive their usefulness for a while; they do not instantly and automatically transform themselves in response to a changed environment. So we find craft unions still the prevailing form of labor organization. But they are growing ineffective, and those that adopt the industrial form will stand the best chance of maintaining themselves in the fight against organized capital. The scientific way for those who see the desirability of industrial unionism to act is to point out this tendency; to show the practical advantages of industrial unionism right here and now, and to get real labor unions, comprising all the workmen in any one plant or industry, to reorganize themselves on an industrial basis. The utopian way is to urge the socialists in the old unions to leave them and organize rival unions, so as to be ready to run the Co-operative Commonwealth when it is voted in. When the campaign for industrial unionism in the United States is started on the scientific basis, we believe that something will happen soon. And the capitalists, as explained in our World of Labor department this month, are doing their share to help things along. Let us be duly grateful, and let us hold up our end the best

we can.

SOCIALISM

ABROAD

Japan. Persecution after persecution. Arrest after arrest. But the Japanese government can not do any better than to make the socialist movement there ever stronger and brighter. On last December 27th the socialists of Tokio had a well attended meeting at the Yoshidays Hall, Kanda, where they usually met, but unfortunately the police told the owner of the hall that if he continued to rent it to the socialists he would have trouble very soon. So the frightened owner had to refuse the socialists the right to meet there any longer. On the 17th of January Comrades in Tokio, at last, decided to have their weekly meetings in the upstairs of the socialist publishing house, The Heimin Sho oo, where, however, again the police followed their track, and rushed into the house interrupting their meeting. Some of the Comrades became inpatient and got up on the roof and made a strong attack on the barbarous action of the police. While at least 3000 people on the streets listened to the fiery speeches of the socialists, half with curiosity and half with enthusiasm, the police sent the message to headquarters, and instantly thirty more policemen were sent to the place and arrested six socialists who opposed them and made speeches. Comrade Osugi, one of the six, had just come out of jail where he had to serve six months' imprisonment for the sake of socialism. The Rodosha, a little monthly sheet of propaganda for February, was devoted to the interest of farmers and made the "farmer special." It is said that the issue was distributed all over the country and made a very effective appeal to the farmers. The Nippon Heiminshinbun-a socialist paper-has been exposing the internal picture of The Osaka Arsenal in its current numbers. The Arsenal is conducted by the government, but the treatment the employees receive there is inexcusably cruel. According to the figures of 1907 there were 11,780 men and 298 women workers employed and the monthly wage they receive in all was 241,200 yen. Wages are paid by the hour. The lowest average sum the men get is 2 sen 8-10 an hour. Women, and children get about 1 sen 8-10 an hour. After its careful investigation the Japanese government had found "seven dangerous Japanese" who at present are residing in the United States. Kilichi Kaneko, who is the publisher of The Socialist Woman, is said to be one of them.

England. In English papers of all complexions the chief subject for discussion during the past month has been the resolution adopted by the Laborites in their conference at Hull. It will be remembered that Socialism, defined in the orthodox way, was accepted as "a definite object" of the Labor Party's activity. Certain Socialists

are discontented because the first of their resolutions was voted down, tho a second one, practically the same, received a majority the following day: they object also to the provision that Laborites who stand for election are not to be designated as Socialists. Liberal and Conservative leaders, however, regard the new move as a complete Socialist victory. The defeat of the first motion appears to them in the nature of a blind to the public.

In two ways the Hull resolution is resulting in great good. The Liberals have all along claimed the Laborites as their "advance wing," and some of the Labor Party leaders have evidently had their eye on Liberal cabinet positions. It is easy to see why these latter have refused to profess any principles: principles are liable to prove embarrassing to a man after an office. And these very men have been mistakenly supported by Socialist voters. But now all this must end; already there are signs of cleavage between the servants of God and mammon. Socialist voters will soon know who's who.

But perhaps the most important result of the passage of the resolution is the attention called to the Socialist cause. The public is astounded to find it able to command 510,000 votes. The old party

papers are in what the English call a "dead funk.” Monthly and quarterly magazines join frantically in the hue and cry. Even the staid old, blue-covered Edinburgh Review is running a series of anti-Socialist articles.

At this writing Parliament has been in session just a month. And a stupid month it has been-except for the humor of the thing. The long promised war against the Lords is yet to begin. There was no mention of it in the address from the throne. Later came

the news that it was to be precipitated by the prompt passage of the Scotch Land Holders bill, but now it is rumored that the militant Premier, who was to have led in the struggle, is himself to become a lord.

Colonial affairs are hardly calculated to give the much needed comfort to the ministerial mind. The Transvaal government refuses to modify materially its attitude toward the Hindus. Partially on this account Indian discontent requires contantly more drastic repressive measures. "The word Empire loses its meaning," said a prominent Hindu recently, "when one subject is ill-treated by another." In view of the increasing uneasiness at home and abroad it is hardly to be wondered at that every new by-election goes to the Conservatives by an increased majority.

France. In France both Senate and Chamber of Deputies are dealing with troublesome problems. The first of these is the Moroccan policy. On Jan. 30th. a new Sultan, Mulai Hafid, set up in opposition to the old one and so became leader of the anti-French forces. His followers are fighting with religious zeal. The French, under General d'Amade, recently defeated them and destroyed the native town of Settat. So inspirited were the deputies by this and other victories that they voted by a large majority to uphold the ministry in its policy of conquest. Needless to say M. Jaurès made good use of the occasion to exhibit in its full glory this new evidence of the white man's superiority. The latest report from Morocco is of a French defeat.

So far as internal policies are concerned our state Socialists, M. Viviani and the rest. are having a sad time of it. They have managed to cut down the period of military service by a few days

while the conservatives wept as though universe were growing unstable but beyond that they have accomplished_nothing. Their two great projects, the purchase of the Western Railway and the providing of old age pensions, halt for lack of funds. A commision appointed to investigate the possibility of carrying out the latter measure reports that about 2,699,000 persons would be entitled to pensions: if each of these were to receive two dollars per month the amount required would be $60,000,000, or more than the whole budget hitherto. The rich, like their English comrades, object to paying added taxes, and the poor can contribute little. Even charity runs foul of the rights of property.

Germany. The Social Democrats are devoting their best energies to increasing and directing the discontent which recently found expression in the Berlin demonstrations. Meetings are being held throughout Germany in the interest of electoral reform in Prussia: Socialist periodicals warmly discuss the means to be used if the government remains obdurate. The weight of opinion seems to favor a campaign of education among workingmen and small trades-people. The feeling against the government is increased by high-handed persecution of Socialists. Not much came of the raid reported in this department last month: one man was sentenced to six weeks imprisonment and another was fined ten marks. But there have been scores of new arrests. The German police are placed at the disposal of the Russian government for the arrest and extradition of revolutionists. This much was proved by the famous Königshütte case. And in the ruthless harrying of native malcontents the German authorities are close seconds to their brethren across the eastern border. Early in January seventeen persons, some of them Russians, were arrested in the house of a Socialist at Charlottenburg, a suburb of Berlin. They are now in prison awaiting trial. More recently in Leipzig a socialist debating club was broken up by the police and its leading members were measured and photographed for the rogues' gallery. The Russian Socialist Party has recently published a categorical statement of its opposition to Anarchist tactics, especially to terrorism. This statement has been approved of and widely published in Germany. Nevertheless everyone opposed to the German government is described as an Anarchist and proceeded against though he were a terrorist.

Belgium. There is still a good deal of talk about the great longshoremen's strike at Antwerp. Nothing could have shown more conclusively the superiority of the present organization of capital over that of labor. In 1900 there was organized at the Belgian capital the Federation maritime, a combine of vessel-owners backed by similar organizations at London, Liverpool, Hamburg and other foreign ports. Since the time of its organization the Federation has brought down the wages of its employees from ten to twenty cents a day, a very serious matter to men who at best can work only half time. Its most intolerable measure, however, was the creation of a "union" of its own, a union controlled absolutely by capitalists. The men were forced to leave their own organizations and enter this new one designed to keep them in their place.

The struggle began with a partial strike of the longshoremen, whose pay had been reduced from six francs to five. An attempt to force the men still at work to scab on their comrades resulted in a general strike. By the end of 1st August 15,000 men had walked out. The Mayor of Antwerp attempted to persuade the officers of the

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