June 16, 1918
Comrades, friends and fellow-workers, for this
very cordial greeting, this very hearty reception, I thank you all with
the fullest appreciation of your interest in and your devotion to the
cause for which I am to speak to you this afternoon.
To speak for labor; to plead the cause of the men and women and
children who toil; to serve the working class, has always been to me a
high privilege; a duty of love.
I have just returned from a visit over yonder, where three of our most
loyal comrades are paying the penalty for their devotion to the cause of
the working class. They have come to realize, as many of us have, that
it is extremely dangerous to exercise the constitutional right of free
speech in a country fighting to make democracy safe in the world.
I realize that, in speaking to you this afternoon, there are certain
limitations placed upon the right of free speech. I must be exceedingly
careful, prudent, as to what I say, and even more careful and prudent as
to how I say it. I may not be able to say all I think; but I am not
going to say anything that I do not think. I would rather a thousand
times be a free soul in jail than to be a sycophant and coward in the
streets. They may put those boys in jail—and some of the rest of us in
jail—but they can not put the Socialist movement in jail. Those prison
bars separate their bodies from ours, but their souls are here this
afternoon. They are simply paying the penalty that all men have paid in
all the ages of history for standing erect, and for seeking to pave the
way to better conditions for mankind.
If it had not been for the men and women who, in the past, have had the
moral courage to go to jail, we would still be in the jungles.
This assemblage is exceedingly good to look upon. I wish it were
possible for me to give you what you are giving me this afternoon. What I
say here amounts to but little; what I see here is exceedingly
important. You workers in Ohio, enlisted in the greatest cause ever
organized in the interest of your class, are making history today in the
face of threatening opposition of all kinds—history that is going to be
read with profound interest by coming generations.
There is but one thing you have to be concerned about, and that is that
you keep foursquare with the principles of the international Socialist
movement. It is only when you begin to compromise that trouble begins.
So far as I am concerned, it does not matter what others may say, or
think, or do, as long as I am sure that I am right with myself and the
cause. There are so many who seek refuge in the popular side of a great
question. As a Socialist, I have long since learned how to stand alone.
For the last month I have been traveling over the Hoosier State; and,
let me say to you, that, in all my connection with the Socialist
movement, I have never seen such meetings, such enthusiasm, such unity
of purpose; never have I seen such a promising outlook as there is
today, notwithstanding the statement published repeatedly that our
leaders have deserted us. Well, for myself, I never had much faith in
leaders. I am willing to be charged with almost anything, rather than to
be charged with being a leader. I am suspicious of leaders, and
especially of the intellectual variety. Give me the rank and file every
day in the week. If you go to the city of Washington, and you examine
the pages of the Congressional Directory, you will find that almost all
of those corporation lawyers and cowardly politicians, members of
Congress, and misrepresentatives of the masses—you will find that almost
all of them claim, in glowing terms, that they have risen from the
ranks to places of eminence and distinction. I am very glad I cannot
make that claim for myself. I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen
from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from the
ranks.
When I came away from Indiana, the comrades said: “When you cross the
line and get over into the Buckeye State, tell the comrades there that
we are on duty and doing duty. Give them for us, a hearty greeting, and
tell them that we are going to make a record this fall that will be read
around the world.”
ŒThe Socialists of Ohio, it appears, are very much alive this year. The
party has been killed recently, which, no doubt, accounts for its
extraordinary activity. There is nothing that helps the Socialist Party
so much as receiving an occasional deathblow. The oftener it is killed
the more active, the more energetic, the more powerful it becomes.
They who have been reading the capitalist newspapers realize what a
capacity they have for lying. We have been reading them lately. They
know all about the Socialist Party—the Socialist movement, except what
is true. Only the other day they took an article that I had written—and
most of you have read it—most of you members of the party, at least—and
they made it appear that I had undergone a marvelous transformation. I
had suddenly become changed—had in fact come to my senses; I had ceased
to be a wicked Socialist, and had become a respectable Socialist , a
patriotic Socialist—as if I had ever been anything else.
What was the purpose of this deliberate misrepresentation? It is so
self-evident that it suggests itself. The purpose was to sow the seeds
of dissension in our ranks; to have it appear that we were divided among
ourselves; that we were pitted against each other, to our mutual
undoing. But Socialists were not born yesterday. They know how to read
capitalist newspapers ; and to believe exactly the opposite of what they
read.
Why should a Socialist be discouraged on the eve of the greatest
triumph in all the history of the Socialist movement? It is true that
these are anxious, trying days for us all—testing days for the women and
men who are upholding the banner of labor in the struggle of the
working class of all the world against the exploiters of all the world; a
time in which the weak and cowardly will falter and fail and desert.
They lack the fiber to endure the revolutionary test; they fall away;
they disappear as if they had never been. On the other hand, they who
are animated by the unconquerable spirit of the social revolution; they
who have the moral courage to stand erect and assert their convictions;
stand by them; fight for them; go to jail or to hell for them, if need
be —they are writing their names, in this crucial hour—they are writing
their names in faceless letters in the history of mankind.
Those boys over yonder—those comrades of ours—and how I love them! Aye,
they are my younger brothers ; their very names throb in my heart,
thrill in my veins, and surge in my soul. I am proud of them; they are
there for us; and we are here for them. Their lips, though temporarily
mute, are more eloquent than ever before; and their voice, though
silent, is heard around the world.
Are we opposed to Prussian militarism? Why, we have been fighting it
since the day the Socialist movement was born; and we are going to
continue to fight it, day and night, until it is wiped from the face of
the earth. Between us there is no truce—no compromise.
But, before I proceed along this line, let me recall a little history, in which I think we are all interested.
In 1869 that grand old warrior of the social revolution, the elder
Liebknecht, was arrested and sentenced to prison for three months,
because of his war, as a Socialist, on the Kaiser and on the Junkers
that rule Germany. In the meantime the Franco-Prussian war broke out.
Liebknecht and Bebel were the Socialist members in the Reichstag. They
were the only two who had the courage to protest against taking
Alsace-Lorraine from France and annexing it to Germany. And for this
they were sentenced two years to a prison fortress charged with high
treason; because, even in that early day, almost fifty years ago, these
leaders, these forerunners of the international Socialist movement were
fighting the Kaiser and fighting the Junkers of Germany. They have
continued to fight them from that day to this. Multiplied thousands of
Socialists have languished in the jails of Germany because of their
heroic warfare upon the despotic ruling class of that country.
Let us come down the line a little farther. You remember that, at the
close of Theodore Roosevelt’s second term as President, he went over to
Africa to make war on some of his ancestors. You remember that, at the
close of his expedition, he visited the capitals of Europe; and that he
was wined and dined, dignified and glorified by all the Kaisers and
Czars and Emperors of the Old World. He visited Potsdam while the Kaiser
was there; and, according to the accounts published in the American
newspapers, he and the Kaiser were soon on the most familiar terms. They
were hilariously intimate with each other, and slapped each other on
the back. After Roosevelt had reviewed the Kaiser’s troops, according to
the same accounts, he became enthusiastic over the Kaiser’s legions and
said: “If I had that kind of an army, I could conquer the world.” He
knew the Kaiser then just as well as he knows him now. He knew that he
was the Kaiser, the Beast of Berlin. And yet, he permitted himself to be
entertained by that Beast of Berlin; had his feet under the mahogany of
the Beast of Berlin; was cheek by jowl with the Beast of Berlin. And,
while Roosevelt was being entertained royally by the German Kaiser, that
same Kaiser was putting the leaders of the Socialist Party in jail for
fighting the Kaiser and the Junkers of Germany. Roosevelt was the guest
of honor in the white house of the Kaiser, while the Socialists were in
the jails of the Kaiser for fighting the Kaiser. Who then was fighting
for democracy? Roosevelt? Roosevelt, who was honored by the Kaiser, or
the Socialists who were in jail by order of the Kaiser?
“Birds of a feather flock together.”
When the newspapers reported that Kaiser Wilhelm and ax-President
Theodore recognized each other at sight, were perfectly intimate with
each other at the first touch, they made the admission that is fatal to
the claim of Theodore Roosevelt, that he is the friend of the common
people and the champion of democracy; they admitted that they were kith
and kin; that they were very much alike; that their ideas and ideals
were about the same. If Theodore Roosevelt is the great champion of
democracy —the arch foe of autocracy , what business had he as the guest
of honor of the Prussian Kaiser? And when he met the Kaiser, and did
honor to the Kaiser, under the terms imputed to him, wasn’t it pretty
strong proof that he himself was a Kaiser at heart? Now, after being the
guest of Emperor Wilhelm, the Beast of Berlin, he comes back to this
country, and wants you to send ten million men over there to kill the
Kaiser; to murder his former friend and pal. Rather queer, isn’t it? And
yet, he is the patriot, and we are the traitors. I challenge you to
find a Socialist anywhere on the face of the earth who was ever the
guest of the Beast of Berlin , except as an inmate of his prison—the
elder Liebknecht and the younger Liebknecht, the heroic son of his
immortal sire.
ŒA little more history along the same line. In 1902 Prince Henry paid a
visit to this country. Do you remember him? I do, exceedingly well.
Prince Henry is the brother of Emperor Wilhelm. Prince Henry is another
Beast of Berlin, an autocrat, an aristocrat, a Junker of Junkers—very
much despised by our American patriots. He came over here in 1902 as the
representative of Kaiser Wilhelm; he was received by Congress and by
several state legislatures—among others, by the state legislature of
Massachusetts, then in session. He was invited there by the capitalist
captains of that so-called commonwealth. And when Prince Henry arrived,
there was one member of that body who kept his self-respect, put on his
hat, and as Henry, the Prince, walked in, that member of the body walked
out. And that was James F. Carey, the Socialist member of that body.
All the rest—all the rest of the representatives in the Massachusetts
legislature—all, all of them—joined in doing honor, in the most servile
spirit, to the high representative of the autocracy of Europe. And the
only man who left that body, was a Socialist. And yet , and yet they
have the hardihood to claim that they are fighting autocracy and that we
are in the service of the German government.
A little more history along the same line. I have a distinct
recollection of it. It occurred fifteen years ago when Prince Henry came
here. All of our plutocracy, all of the wealthy representatives living
along Fifth Avenue—all, all of them—threw their palace doors wide open
and received Prince Henry with open arms. But they were not satisfied
with this; they got down and grovelled in the dust at his feet. Our
plutocracy—women and men alike—vied with each other to lick the boots of
Prince Henry, the brother and representative of the “Beast of Berlin.”
And still our plutocracy, our Junkers, would have us believe that all
the Junkers are confined to Germany. It is precisely because we refuse
to believe this that they brand us as disloyalists. They want our eyes
focused on the Junkers in Berlin so that we will not see those within
our own borders.
I hate, I loathe, I despise Junkers and junkerdom. I have no earthly
use for the Junkers of Germany, and not one particle more use for the
Junkers in the United States.
They tell us that we live in a great free republic; that our
institutions are democratic; that we are a free and self-governing
people. This is too much, even for a joke. But it is not a subject for
levity; it is an exceedingly serious matter.
To whom do the Wall Street Junkers in our country marry their
daughters? After they have wrung their countless millions from your
sweat, your agony and your life’s blood, in a time of war as in a time
of peace, they invest these untold millions in the purchase of titles of
broken-down aristocrats, such as princes, dukes, counts and other
parasites and no-accounts. Would they be satisfied to wed their
daughters to honest workingmen? To real democrats? Oh, no! They scour
the markets of Europe for vampires who are titled and nothing else. And
they swap their millions for the titles, so that matrimony with them
becomes literally a matter of money.
These are the gentry who are today wrapped up in the American flag, who
shout their claim from the housetops that they are the only patriots,
and who have their magnifying glasses in hand, scanning the country for
evidence of disloyalty, eager to apply the brand of treason to the men
who dare to even whisper their opposition to Junker rule in the United
Sates. No wonder Sam Johnson declared that “patriotism is the last
refuge of the scoundrel.” He must have had this Wall Street gentry in
mind, or at least their prototypes, for in every age it has been the
tyrant, the oppressor and the exploiter who has wrapped himself in the
cloak of patriotism, or religion, or both to deceive and overawe the
people.
They would have you believe that the Socialist Party consists in the
main of disloyalists and traitors. It is true in a sense not at all to
their discredit. We frankly admit that we are disloyalists and traitors
to the real traitors of this nation; to the gang that on the Pacific
coast are trying to hang Tom Mooney and Warren Billings in spite of
their well-known innocence and the protest of practically the whole
civilized world.
I know Tom Mooney intimately—as if he were my own brother. He is an
absolutely honest man. He had no more to do with the crime with which he
was charged and for which he was convicted than I had. And if he ought
to go to the gallows, so ought I. If he is guilty every man who belongs
to a labor organization or to the Socialist Party is likewise guilty.
What is Tom Mooney guilty of? I will tell you. I am familiar with his
record. For years he has been fighting bravely and without compromise
the battles of the working class out on the Pacific coast. He refused to
be bribed and he could not be browbeaten. In spite of all attempts to
intimidate him he continued loyally in the service of the organized
workers, and for this he became a marked man. The henchmen of the
powerful and corrupt corporations, concluding finally that he could not
be bought or bribed or bullied, decided he must therefore be murdered.
That is why Tom Mooney is today a life prisoner, and why he would have
been hanged as a felon long ago but for the world-wide protest of the
working class.
Let us review another bit of history. You remember Francis J. Heney,
special investigator of the state of California, who was shot down in
cold blood in the courtroom in San Francisco. You remember that
dastardly crime, do you not? The United Railways, consisting of a lot of
plutocrats and highbinders represented by the Chamber of Commerce,
absolutely control the city of San Francisco. The city was and is their
private reservation. Their will is the supreme law. Take your stand
against them and question their authority, and you are doomed. They do
not hesitate a moment to plot murder or any other crime to perpetuate
their corrupt and enslaving regime. Tom Mooney was the chief
representative of the working class they could not control. They own the
railways; they control the great industries; they are the industrial
masters and the political rulers of the people. From their decision
there is no appeal. They are the autocrats of the Pacific coast—as cruel
and infamous as any that ever ruled in Germany or any other country in
the old world. When their rule became so corrupt that at last a grand
jury indicted them and they were placed on trial, and Francis J. Heney
was selected to assist in their prosecution, this gang, represented by
the Chamber of Commerce; this gang of plutocrats, autocrats and
highbinders, hired an assassin to shoot Heney down in the courtroom.
Heney, however, happened to live through it. But that was not their
fault. The same identical gang that hired the murderer to kill Heney
also hired false witnesses to swear away the fife of Tom Mooney and,
foiled in that, they have kept him in a foul prisonhole ever since.
Every solitary one of these aristocratic conspirators and would-be
murderers claims to be an arch-patriot; every one of them insists that
the war is being waged to make the world safe for democracy. What
humbug! What rot! What false pretense! These autocrats, these tyrants,
these red-handed robbers and murderers, the “patriots,” while the men
who have the courage to stand face to face with them, speak the truth,
and fight for their exploited victims—they are the disloyalists and
traitors. If this be true, I want to take my place side by side with the
traitors in this fight.
The other day they sentenced Kate Richards O’Hare to the penitentiary
for five years. Think of sentencing a woman to the penitentiary simply
for talking. The United States, under plutocratic rule, is the only
country that would send a woman to prison for five years for exercising
the right of free speech. If this be treason, let them make the most of
it.
Let me review a bit of history in connection with this case. I have
known Kate Richards O’Hare intimately for twenty years. I am familiar
with her public record. Personally I know her as if she were my own
sister. All who know Mrs. O’Hare know her to be a woman of unquestioned
integrity.’ And they also know that she is a woman of unimpeachable
loyalty to the Socialist movement. When she went out into North Dakota
to make her speech, followed by plain-clothes men in the service of the
government intent upon effecting her arrest and securing her prosecution
and conviction—when she went out there, it was with the full knowledge
on her part that sooner or later these detectives would accomplish their
purpose. She made her speech, and that speech was deliberately
misrepresented for the purpose of securing her conviction. The only
testimony against her was that of a hired witness. And when the farmers,
the men and women who were in the audience she addressed—when they went
to Bismarck where the trial was held to testify in her favor, to swear
that she had not used the language she was charged with having used, the
judge refused to allow them to go upon the stand. This would seem
incredible to me if I had not had some experience of my own with federal
courts.
Who appoints our federal judges? The people? In all the history of the
country, the working class have never named a federal judge. There are
121 of these judges and every solitary one holds his position, his
tenure, through the influence and power of corporate capital. The
corporations and trusts dictate their appointment. And when they go to
the bench, they go, not to serve, the people, but to serve the interests
that place them and keep them where they are.
Why, the other day, by a vote of five to four—a kind of craps game—come
seven, come ‘leven —they declared the child labor law
unconstitutional—a law secured after twenty years of education and
agitation on the part of all kinds of people. And yet, by a majority of
one, the Supreme Court a body of corporation lawyers, with just one
exception, wiped that law from the statute books, and this in our
so-called democracy, so that we may continue to grind the flesh and
blood and bones of puny little children into profits for the Junkers of
Wall Street. And this in a country that boasts of fighting to make the
world safe for democracy! The history of this country is being written
in the blood of the childhood the industrial lords have murdered.
These are not palatable truths to them. They do not like to hear them;
and what is more they do not want you to hear them. And that is why they
brand us as undesirable citizens , and as disloyalists and traitors. If
we were actual traitors—traitors to the people and to their welfare and
progress, we would be regarded as eminently respectable citizens of the
republic; we would hold high office, have princely incomes, and ride in
limousines; and we would be pointed out as the elect who have succeeded
in life in honorable pursuit, and worthy of emulation by the youth of
the land. It is precisely because we are disloyal to the traitors that
we are loyal to the people of this nation.
Scott Nearing! You have heard of Scott Nearing. He is the greatest
teacher in the United States. He was in the University of Pennsylvania
until the Board of Trustees, consisting of great capitalists, captains
of industry, found that he was teaching sound economics to the students
in his classes. This sealed his fate in that institution. They
sneeringly charged—just as the same usurers, money-changers, pharisees,
hypocrites charged the Judean Carpenter some twenty centuries ago—that
he was a false teacher and that he was stirring up the people.
The Man of Galilee, the Carpenter, the workingman who became the
revolutionary agitator of his day soon found himself to be an
undesirable citizen in the eyes of the ruling knaves and they had him
crucified. And now their lineal descendants say of Scott Nearing, “He is
preaching false economics. We cannot crucify him as we did his elder
brother but we can deprive him of employment and so cut off his income
and starve him to death or into submission. We will not only discharge
him but place his name upon the blacklist and make it impossible for him
to earn a living. He is a dangerous man for he is teaching the truth
and opening the eyes of the people.” And the truth, oh, the truth has
always been unpalatable and intolerable to the class who live out of the
sweat and misery of the working class.
Max Eastman has been indicted and his paper suppressed, just as the
papers with which I have been connected have all been suppressed. What a
wonderful compliment they pay us! They are afraid that we may mislead
and contaminate you. You are their wards; they are your guardians and
they know what is best for you to read and hear and know. They are bound
to see to it that our vicious doctrines do not reach your ears. And so
in our great democracy, under our free institutions, they flatter our
press by suppression; and they ignorantly imagine that they have
silenced revolutionary propaganda in the United States. What an awful
mistake they make for our benefit! As a matter of justice to them we
should respond with resolutions of thanks and gratitude. Thousands of
people who had never before heard of our papers are now inquiring for
and insisting upon seeing them. They have succeeded only in arousing
curiosity in our literature and propaganda. And woe to him who reads
Socialist literature from curiosity! He is surely a goner. I have known
of a thousand experiments but never one that failed.
John M. Work! You know John, now on the editorial staff of the
Milwaukee Leader! When I first knew him he was a lawyer out in Iowa. The
capitalists out there became alarmed because of the rapid growth of the
Socialist movement. So they said: “We have to find some able fellow to
fight this menace.” They concluded that John Work was the man for the
job and they said to him: “John, you are a bright young lawyer; you have
a brilliant future before you. We want to engage you to find out all
you can about socialism and then proceed to counteract its baneful
effects and check its further growth.”
John at once provided himself with Socialist literature and began his
study of the red menace, with the result that after he had read and
digested a few volumes he was a full-fledged Socialist and has been
fighting for socialism ever since.
ŒHow stupid and shortsighted the ruling class really is! Cupidity is
stone blind. It has no vision. The greedy, profit-seeking exploiter
cannot see beyond the end of his nose. He can see a chance for an
“opening”; he is cunning enough to know what graft is and where it is,
and how it can be secured, but vision he has none—not the slightest. He
knows nothing of the great throbbing world that spreads out in all
directions. He has no capacity for literature; no appreciation of art;
no soul for beauty. That is the penalty the parasites pay for the
violation of the laws of life. The Rockefellers are blind. Every move
they make in their game of greed but hastens their own doom. Every blow
they strike at the Socialist movement reacts upon themselves. Every time
they strike at us they hit themselves. It never fails. Every time they
strangle a Socialist paper they add a thousand voices proclaiming the
truth of the principles of socialism and the ideals of the Socialist
movement. They help us in spite of themselves.
Socialism is a growing idea; an expanding philosophy. It is spreading
over the entire face of the earth: It is as vain to resist it as it
would be to arrest the sunrise on the morrow. It is coming, coming,
coming all along the line. Can you not see it? If not, I advise you to
consult an oculist. There is certainly something the matter with your
vision. It is the mightiest movement in the history of mankind. What a
privilege to serve it! I have regretted a thousand times that I can do
so little for the movement that has done so much for me. The little that
I am, the little that I am hoping to be, I owe to the Socialist
movement. It has given me my ideas and ideals; my principles and
convictions, and I would not exchange one of them for all of
Rockefeller’s bloodstained dollars. It has taught me how to serve—a
lesson to me of priceless value. It has taught me the ecstasy in the
handclasp of a comrade. It has enabled me to hold high communion with
you, and made it possible for me to take my place side by side with you
in the great struggle for the better day; to multiply myself over and
over again, to thrill with a fresh-born manhood; to feel life truly
worthwhile; to open new avenues of vision; to spread out glorious
vistas; to know that I am kin to all that throbs; to be class-conscious,
and to realize that, regardless of nationality, race, creed, color or
sex, every man, every woman who toils, who renders useful service, every
member of the working class without an exception, is my comrade, my
brother and sister—and that to serve them and their cause is the highest
duty of my life.
And in their service I can feel myself expand; I can rise to the
stature of a man and claim the right to a place on earth—a place where I
can stand and strive to speed the day of industrial freedom and social
justice.
Yes, my comrades, my heart is attuned to yours. Aye, all our hearts now
throb as one great heart responsive to the battle cry of the social
revolution. Here, in this alert and inspiring assemblage our hearts are
with the Bolsheviki of Russia. Those heroic men and women, those
unconquerable comrades have by their incomparable valor and sacrifice
added fresh luster to the fame of the international movement. Those
Russian comrades of ours have made greater sacrifices, have suffered
more, and have shed more heroic blood than any like number of men and
women anywhere on earth; they have laid the foundation of the first real
democracy that ever drew the breath of life in this world. And the very
first act of the triumphant Russian revolution was to proclaim a state
of peace with all mankind, coupled with a fervent moral appeal, not to
kings, not to emperors, rulers or diplomats but to the people of all
nations. Here we have the very breath of democracy, the quintessence of
the dawning freedom. The Russian revolution proclaimed its glorious
triumph in its ringing and inspiring appeal to the peoples of all the
earth. In a humane and fraternal spirit new Russia, emancipated at last
from the curse of the centuries, called upon all nations engaged in the
frightful war, the Central Powers as well as the Allies, to send
representatives to a conference to lay down terms of peace that should
be just and lasting. Here was the supreme opportunity to strike the blow
to make the world safe for democracy. Was there any response to that
noble appeal that in some day to come will be written in letters of gold
in the history of the world? Was there any response whatever to that
appeal for universal peace? No, not the slightest attention was paid to
it by the Christian nations engaged in the terrible slaughter.
It has been charged that Lenin and Trotsky and the leaders of the
revolution were treacherous, that they made a traitorous peace with
Germany. Let us consider that proposition briefly. At the time of the
revolution Russia had been three years in the war. Under the Czar she
had lost more than four million of her ill-clad, poorly-equipped,
half-starved soldiers, slain outright or disabled on the field of
battle. She was absolutely bankrupt. Her soldiers were mainly without
arms. This was what was bequeathed to the revolution by the Czar and his
regime; and for this condition Lenin and Trotsky were not responsible,
nor the Bolsheviki. For this appalling state of affairs the Czar and his
rotten bureaucracy were solely responsible. When the Bolsheviki came
into power and went through the archives they found and exposed the
secret treaties—the treaties that were made between the Czar and the
French government, the British government and the Italian government,
proposing, after the victory was achieved, to dismember the German
Empire and destroy the Central Powers. These treaties have never been
denied nor repudiated. Very little has been said about them in the
American press. I have a copy of these treaties, showing that the
purpose of the Allies is exactly the purpose of the Central Powers, and
that is the conquest and spoilation of the weaker nations that has
always been the purpose of war.
Wars throughout history have been waged for conquest and plunder. In
the Middle Ages when the feudal lords who inhabited the castles whose
towers may still be seen along the Rhine concluded to enlarge their
domains, to increase their power, their prestige and their wealth they
declared war upon one another. But they themselves did not go to war any
more than the modern feudal lords, the barons of Wall Street go to war.
The feudal barons of the Middle Ages, the economic predecessors of the
capitalists of our day, declared all wars. And their miserable serfs
fought all the battles. The poor, ignorant serfs had been taught to
revere their masters; to believe that when their masters declared war
upon one another, it was their patriotic duty to fall upon one another
and to cut one another’s throats for the profit and glory of the lords
and barons who held them in contempt. And that is war in a nutshell. The
master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always
fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to
lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and all to
lose—especially their lives.
They have always taught and trained you to believe it to be your
patriotic duty to go to war and to have yourselves slaughtered at their
command. But in all the history of the world you, the people, have never
had a voice in declaring war, and strange as it certainly appears, no
war by any nation in any age has ever been declared by the people.
And here let me emphasize the fact—and it cannot be repeated too
often—that the working class who fight all the battles, the working
class who make the supreme sacrifices, the working class who freely shed
their blood and furnish the corpses, have never yet had a voice in
either declaring war or making peace. It is the ruling class that
invariably does both. They alone declare war and they alone make peace.
Yours not to reason why;
Yours but to do and die.
That is their motto and we object on the part of the awakening workers of this nation.
If war is right let it be declared by the people. You who have your
lives to lose, you certainly above all others have the right to decide
the momentous issue of war or peace.
Rose Pastor Stokes! And when I mention her name I take off my hat. Here
we have another heroic and inspiring comrade. She had her millions of
dollars at command. Did her wealth restrain her an instant? On the
contrary her supreme devotion to the cause outweighed all considerations
of a financial or social nature. She went out boldly to plead the cause
of the working class and they rewarded her high courage with a ten
years’ sentence to the penitentiary. Think of it! Ten years! What
atrocious crime had she committed? What frightful things had she said?
Let me answer candidly. She said nothing more than I have said here this
afternoon. I want to admit—I want to admit without reservation that if
Rose Pastor Stokes is guilty of crime, so am I. If she is guilty for the
brave part she has taken in this testing time of human souls I would
not be cowardly enough to plead my innocence. And if she ought to be
sent to the penitentiary for ten years, so ought I without a doubt.
What did Rose Pastor Stokes say? Why, she said that a government could
not at the same time serve both the profiteers and the victims of the
profiteers. Is it not true? Certainly it is and no one can successfully
dispute it.
Roosevelt said a thousand times more in the very same paper, the Kansas
City Star. Roosevelt said vauntingly the other day that he would be
heard if he went to jail. He knows very well that he is taking no risk
of going to jail. He is shrewdly laying his wires for the Republican
nomination in 1920 and he is an adept in making the appeal of the
demagogue. He would do anything to discredit the Wilson administration
that he may give himself and his party all credit. That is the only
rivalry there is between the two old capitalist parties—the Republican
Party and the Democratic Party—the political twins of the master class.
They are not going to have any friction between them this fall. They are
all patriots in this campaign, and they are going to combine to prevent
the election of any disloyal Socialist. I have never heard anyone tell
of any difference between these corrupt capitalist parties. Do you know
of any? I certainly do not. The situation is that one is in and the
other trying to break in, and that is substantially the only difference
between them.
Rose Pastor Stokes never uttered a word she did not have a legal,
constitutional right to utter. But her message to the people, the
message that stirred their thoughts and opened their eyes—that must be
suppressed; her voice must be silenced. And so she was promptly
subjected to a mock trial and sentenced to the penitentiary for ten
years. Her conviction was a foregone conclusion. The trial of a
Socialist in a capitalist court is at best a farcical affair. What ghost
of a chance had she in a court with a packed jury and a corporation
tool on the bench? Not the least in the world. And so she goes to the
penitentiary for ten years if they carry out their brutal and
disgraceful graceful program. For my part I do not think they will. In
fact I feel sure they will not. If the war were over tomorrow the prison
doors would open to our people. They simply mean to silence the voice
of protest during the war.
What a compliment it is to the Socialist movement to be thus persecuted
for the sake of the truth! The truth alone will make the people free.
And for this reason the truth must not be permitted to reach the people.
The truth has always been dangerous to the rule of the rogue, the
exploiter, the robber. So the truth must be ruthlessly suppressed. That
is why they are trying to destroy the Socialist movement; and every time
they strike a blow they add a thousand new voices to the hosts
proclaiming that socialism is the hope of humanity and has come to
emancipate the people from their final form of servitude.
How good this sip of cool water from the hand of a comrade! It is as
refreshing as if it were out on the desert waste. And how good it is to
look into your glowing faces this afternoon! You are really good looking
to me, I assure you. And I am glad there are so many of you. Your tribe
has increased amazingly since first I came here. You used to be so few
and far between. A few years ago when you struck a town the first thing
you had to do was to see if you could locate a Socialist; and you were
pretty lucky if you struck the trail of one before you left town. If he
happened to be the only one and he is still living, he is now regarded
as a pioneer and pathfinder; he holds a place of honor in your esteem,
and he has lodgment in the hearts of all who have come after him. It is
far different now. You can hardly throw a stone in the dark without
hitting a Socialist. They are everywhere in increasing numbers; and what
marvelous changes are taking place in the people!
Some years ago I was to speak at Warren in this state. It happened to
be at the time that President McKinley was assassinated. In common with
all others I deplored that tragic event. There is not a Socialist who
would have been guilty of that crime. We do not attack individuals. We
do not seek to avenge ourselves upon those opposed to our faith. We have
no fight with individuals as such. We are capable of pitying those who
hate us. We do not hate them; we know better; we would freely give them a
cup of water if they needed it. There is no room in our hearts for
hate, except for the system, the social system in which it is possible
for one man to amass a stupendous fortune doing nothing, while millions
of others suffer and struggle and agonize and die for the bare
necessities of existence.
President McKinley, as I have said, had been assassinated. I was first
to speak at Portsmouth, having been booked there some time before the
assassination. Promptly the Christian ministers of Portsmouth met in
special session and passed a resolution declaring that “Debs, more than
any other person, was responsible for the assassination of our beloved
President.” It was due to the doctrine that Debs was preaching that this
crime was committed, according to these patriotic parsons, and so this
pious gentry, the followers of the meek and lowly Nazarene, concluded
that I must not be permitted to enter the city. And they had the mayor
issue an order to that effect. I went there soon after, however. I was
to speak at Warren, where President McKinley’s double-cousin was
postmaster. I went there and registered. I was soon afterward invited to
leave the hotel. I was exceedingly undesirable that day. I was served
with notice that the hall would not be opened and that I would not be
permitted to speak. I sent back word to the mayor by the only Socialist
left in town—and he only remained because they did not know he was
there—I sent word to the mayor that I would speak in Warren that night,
according to schedule, or I would leave there in a box for the return
turn trip.
The Grand Army of the Republic called a special meeting and then
marched to the hall in full uniform and occupied the front seats in
order to silence me if my speech did not suit them. I went to the hall,
however, found it open, and made my speech. There was no interruption. I
told the audience frankly who was responsible for the President’s
assassination. I said: “As long as there is misery caused by robbery at
the bottom there will be assassination at the top.” I showed them,
evidently to their satisfaction, that it was their own capitalist system
that was responsible; the system that had impoverished and brutalized
the ancestors of the poor witless boy who had murdered the President.
Yes, I made my speech that night and it was well received but when I
left there I was still an “undesirable citizen.”
Some years later I returned to Warren. It seemed that the whole
population was out for the occasion. I was received with open arms. I
was no longer a demagogue; no longer a fanatic or an undesirable
citizen. I had become exceedingly respectable simply because the
Socialists had increased in numbers and socialism had grown in influence
and power. If ever I become entirely respectable I shall be quite sure
that I have outlived myself.
It is the minorities who have made the history of this world. It is the
few who have had the courage to take their places at the front; who
have been true enough to themselves to speak the truth that was in them;
who have dared oppose the established order of things; who have
espoused the cause of the suffering, struggling poor; who have upheld
without regard to personal consequences the cause of freedom and
righteousness. It is they, the heroic, self-sacrificing few who have
made the history of the race and who have paved the way from barbarism
to civilization. The many prefer to remain upon the popular side. They
lack the courage and vision to join a despised minority that stands for a
principle; they have not the moral fiber that withstands, endures and
finally conquers. They are to be pitied and not treated with contempt
for they cannot help their cowardice. But, thank God, in every age and
in every nation there have been the brave and self-reliant few, and they
have been sufficient to their historic task; and we, who are here
today, are under infinite obligations to them because they suffered,
they sacrificed, they went to jail, they had their bones broken upon the
wheel, they were burned at the stake and their ashes scattered to the
winds by the hands of hate and revenge in their struggle to leave the
world better for us than they found it for themselves. We are under
eternal obligations to them because of what they did and what they
suffered for us and the only way we can discharge that obligation is by
doing the best we can for those who are to come after us. And this is
the high purpose of every Socialist on earth. Everywhere they are
animated by the same lofty principles; everywhere they have the same
noble ideals; everywhere they are clasping hands across national
boundary lines; everywhere they are calling one another Comrade, the
blessed word that springs from the heart of unity and bursts into
blossom upon the lips. Each passing day they are getting into closer
touch all along the battle line, wagig the holy war of the working class
of the world against the ruling and exploiting class of the world. They
make many mistakes and they profit by them all. They encounter numerous
defeats, and grow stronger through them all. They never take a backward
step. Œ
The heart of the international Socialist never beats a retreat.
They are pressing forward, here, there and everywhere, in all the zones
that girdle the globe. Everywhere these awakening workers, these
class-conscious proletarians, these hardy sons and daughters of honest
toil are proclaiming the glad tidings of the coming emancipation,
everywhere their hearts are attuned to the most sacred cause that ever
challenged men and women to action in all the history of the world.
Everywhere they are moving toward democracy and the dawn; marching
toward the sunrise, their faces all aglow with the light of the coming
day. These are the Socialists, the most zealous and enthusiastic
crusaders the world has ever known. They are making history that will
light up the horizon of coming generations, for their mission is the
emancipation of the human race. They have been reviled; they have been
ridiculed, persecuted, imprisoned and have suffered death, but they have
been sufficient to themselves and their cause, and their final triumph
is but a question of time.
Do you wish to hasten the day of victory? Join the Socialist Party!
Don’t wait for the morrow. Join now! Enroll your name without fear and
take your place where you belong. You cannot do your duty by proxy. You
have got to do it yourself and do it squarely and then as you look
yourself in the face you will have no occasion to blush. You will know
what it is to be a real man or woman. You will lose nothing; you will
gain everything. Not only will you lose nothing but you will find
something of infinite value, and that something will be yourself. And
that is your supreme need—to find yourself—to really know yourself and
your purpose in life.
You need at this time especially to know that you are fit for something
better than slavery and cannon fodder. You need to know that you were
not created to work and produce and impoverish yourself to enrich an
idle exploiter. You need to know that you have a mind to improve, a soul
to develop, and a manhood to sustain.
You need to know that it is your duty to rise above the animal plane of
existence. You need to know that it is for you to know something about
literature and science and art. You need to know that you are verging on
the edge of a great new world. You need to get in touch with your
comrades and fellow workers and to become conscious of your interests,
your powers and your possibilities as a class. You need to know that you
belong to the great majority of mankind. You need to know that as long
as you are ignorant, as long as you are indifferent, as long as you are
apathetic, unorganized and content, you will remain exactly where you
are. You will be exploited; you will be degraded, and you will have to
beg for a job. You will get just enough for your slavish toil to keep
you in working order, and you will be looked down upon with scorn and
contempt by the very parasites that live and luxuriate out of your sweat
and unpaid labor.
If you would be respected you have got to begin by respecting yourself.
Stand up squarely and look yourself in the face and see a man! Do not
allow yourself to fall into the predicament of the poor fellow who,
after he had heard a Socialist speech concluded that he too ought to be a
Socialist. The argument he had heard was unanswerable. “Yes,” he said
to himself, “all the speaker said was true and I certainly ought to join
the party.” But after a while he allowed his ardor to cool and he
soberly concluded that by joining the party he might anger his boss and
lose his job. He then concluded: “I can’t take the chance.” That night
he slept alone. There was something on his conscience and it resulted in
a dreadful dream. Men always have such dreams when they betray
themselves. A Socialist is free to go to bed with a clear conscience. He
goes to sleep with his manhood and he awakens and walks forth in the
morning with his self-respect. He is unafraid and he can look the whole
world in the face, without a tremor and without a blush. But this poor
weakling who lacked the courage to do the bidding of his reason and
conscience was haunted by a startling dream and at midnight he awoke in
terror, bounded from his bed and exclaimed: “My God, there is nobody in
this room.” He was absolutely right. There was nobody in that room.
How would you like to sleep in a room that had nobody in it? It is an
awful thing to be nobody. That is certainly a state of mind to get out
of, the sooner the better.
There is a great deal of hope for Baker, Ruthenberg and Wagenknecht who
are in jail for their convictions; but for the fellow that is nobody
there is no pardoning power. He is “in” for life. Anybody can be nobody;
but it takes a man to be somebody.
To turn your back on the corrupt Republican Party and the still more
corrupt Democratic Party—the gold-dust lackeys of the ruling class
counts for still more after you have stepped out of those popular and
corrupt capitalist parties to join a minority party that has an ideal,
that stands for a principle, and fights for a cause. This will be the
most important change you have ever made and the time will come when you
will thank me for having made the suggestion. It was the day of days
for me. I remember it well. It was like passing from midnight darkness
to the noontide light of day. It came almost like a flash and found me
ready. It must have been in such a flash that great, seething, throbbing
Russia, prepared by centuries of slavery and tears and martyrdom, was
transformed from a dark continent to a land of living light.
There is something splendid, something sustaining and inspiring in the
prompting of the heart to be true to yourself and to the best you know,
especially in a crucial hour of your life. You are in the crucible
today, my Socialist comrades! You are going to be tried by fire, to what
extent no one knows. If you are weak-fibered and fainthearted you will
be lost to the Socialist movement. We will have to bid you goodbye. You
are not the stuff of which revolutions are made. We are sorry for you
unless you chance to be an “intellectual.” The “intellectuals,” many of
them, are already gone. No loss on our side nor gain on the other.
I am always amused in the discussion of the “intellectual” phase of
this question. It is the same old standard under which the rank and file
are judged. What would become of the sheep if they had no shepherd to
lead them out of the wilderness into the land of milk and honey?
Oh, yes, “I am your shepherd and ye are my mutton.”
They would have us believe that if we had no “intellectuals” we would
have no movement. They would have our party, the rank and file,
controlled by the “intellectual” bosses as the Republican and Democratic
parties are controlled. These capitalist parties are managed by
“intellectual” leaders and the rank and file are sheep that follow the
bellwether to the shambles.
In the Republican and Democratic parties you of the common herd are not
expected to think. That is not only unnecessary but might lead you
astray. That is what the “intellectual” leaders are for. They do the
thinking and you do the voting. They ride in carriages at the front
where the band plays and you tramp in the mud, bringing up the rear with
great enthusiasm.
The capitalist system affects to have great regard and reward for
intellect, and the capitalists give themselves full credit for having
superior brains. When we have ventured to say that the time would come
when the working class would rule they have bluntly answered “Never! it
requires brains to rule.” The workers of course have none. And they
certainly try hard to prove it by proudly supporting the political
parties of their masters under whose administration they are kept in
poverty and servitude.
The government is now operating its railroads for the more effective
prosecution of the war. Private ownership has broken down utterly and
the government has had to come to the rescue. We have always said that
the people ought to own the railroads and operate them for the benefit
of the people. We advocated that twenty years ago. But the capitalists
and their henchmen emphatically objected. “You have got to have brains
to run the railroads,” they tauntingly retorted. Well, the other day
McAdoo, the governor-general of the railroads under government
operation; discharged all the high-salaried presidents and other
supernumeraries. In other words, he fired the “brains” bodily and yet
all the trains have been coming and going on schedule time. Have you
noticed any change for the worse since the “brains” are gone? It is a
brainless system now, being operated by “hands.” But a good deal more
efficiently than it had been operated by so-called “brains” before. And
this determines infallibly the quality of their vaunted, high-priced
capitalist “brains.” It is the kind you can get at a reasonable figure
at the market place. They have always given themselves credit for having
superior brains and given this as the reason for the supremacy of their
class. It is true that they have the brains that indicates the cunning
of the fox, the wolf, but as for brains denoting real intelligence and
the measure of intellectual capacity they are the most woefully ignorant
people on earth. Give me a hundred capitalists just as you find them
here in Ohio and let me ask them a dozen simple questions about the
history of their own country and I will prove to you that they are as
ignorant and unlettered as any you may find in the so-called lower
class. They know little of history; they are strangers to science; they
are ignorant of sociology and blind to art but they know how to exploit,
how to gouge, how to rob, and do it with legal sanction. They always
proceed legally for the reaon that the class which has the power to rob
upon a large scale has also the power to control the government and
legalize their robbery. I regret that lack of time prevents me from
discussing this phase of the question more at length.
They are continually talking about your patriotic duty. It is not their
but your patriotic duty that they are concerned about. There is a
decided difference. Their patriotic duty never takes them to the firing
line or chucks them into the trenches.
And now among other things they are urging you to “cultivate” war
gardens, while at the same time a government war report just issued
shows that practically 52 percent of the arable, tillable soil is held
out of use by the landlords, speculators and profiteers. They themselves
do not cultivate the soil. They could not if they would. Nor do they
allow others to cultivate it. They keep it idle to enrich themselves, to
pocket the millions of dollars of unearned increment. Who is it that
makes this land valuable while it is fenced in and kept out of use? It
is the people. Who pockets this tremendous accumulation of value? The
landlords. And these landlords who toil not and spin not are supreme
among American “patriots.”
In passing I suggest that we stop a moment to think about the term
“landlord.” “LANDLORD!” Lord of the Land! The lord of the land is indeed
a superpatriot. This lord who practically owns the earth tells you that
we are fighting this war to make the world safe for democracy—he who
shuts out all humanity from his private domain; he who profiteers at the
expense of the people who have been slain and mutilated by multiplied
thousands, under pretense of being the great American patriot. It is he,
this identical patriot who is in fact the archenemy of the people; it
is he that you need to wipe from power. It is he who is a far greater
menace to your liberty and your well-being than the Prussian Junkers on
the other side of the Atlantic ocean.
Fifty-two percent of the land kept out of use, according to their own
figures! They tell you that there is an alarming shortage of flour and
that you need to produce more. They tell you further that you have got
to save wheat so that more can be exported for the soldiers who are
fighting on the other side, while half of your tillable soil is held out
of use by the landlords and profiteers. What do you think of that?
Again, they tell you there is a coal famine now in the state of Ohio.
The state of Indiana, where I live, is largely underlaid with coal.
There is practically an inexhaustible supply. The coal is banked beneath
our very feet. It is within touch all about us—all we can possibly use
and more. And here are the miners, ready to enter the mines. Here is the
machinery ready to be put into operation to increase the output to any
desired capacity. And three weeks ago a national officer of the United
Mine Workers issued and published a statement to the Labor Department of
the United States government to the effect that the 600,000 coal miners
in the United States at this time, when they talk about a coal famine,
are not permitted to work more than half time. I have been around over
Indiana for many years. I have often been in the coal fields; again and
again I have seen the miners idle while at the same time there was a
scarcity of coal.
They tell you that you ought to buy your coal right away; that you may
freeze next winter if you do not. At the same time they charge you three
prices for your coat Oh, yes, this ought to suit you perfectly if you
vote the Republican or Democratic ticket and believe in the private
ownership of the coal mines and their operation for private profit.
The coal mines now being privately owned, the operators want a scarcity
of coal so they can boost their prices and enrich themselves
accordingly. If an abundance of coal were mined there would be lower
prices and this would not suit the mine owners. Prices soar and profits
increase when there is a scarcity of coal.
It is also apparent that there is collusion between the mine owners and
the railroads. The mine owners declare there are no cars while the
railroad men insist that there is no coal. And between them they delude,
defraud and rob the people.
Let us illustrate a vital point. Here is the coal in great deposits all
about us; here are the miners and the machinery of production. Why
should there be a coal famine upon the one hand and an army of idle and
hungry miners on the other hand? Is it not an incredibly stupid
situation, an almost idiotic if not criminal state of affairs?
We Socialists say: “Take possession of the mines in the name of the
people.” Set the miners at work and give every miner the equivalent of
all the coal he produces. Reduce the work day in proportion to the
development of productive machinery. That would at once settle the
matter of a coal famine and of idle miners. But that is too simple a
proposition and the people will have none of it. The time will come,
however, when the people will be driven to take such action for there is
no other efficient and permanent solution of the problem.
In the present system the miner, a wage slave, gets down into a pit 300
or 400 feet deep. He works hard and produces a ton of coal. But he does
not own an ounce of it. That coal belongs to some mine-owning plutocrat
who may be in New York or sailing the high seas in his private yacht;
or he may be hobnobbing with royalty in the capitals of Europe, and that
is where most of them were before the war was declared. The industrial
captain, so- called, who lives in Paris, London, Vienna or some other
center of gaiety does not have to work to revel in luxury. He owns the
mines and he might as well own the miners.
That is where you workers are and where you will remain as long as you
give your support to the political parties of your masters and
exploiters. You vote these miners out of a job and reduce them to
corporation vassals and paupers.
We Socialists say: “Take possession of the mines; call the miner to
work and return to him the equivalent of the value of his product.” He
can then build himself a comfortable home; live in it; enjoy it with his
family. He can provide himself and his wife and children with
clothes—good clothes—not shoddy; wholesome food in abundance, education
for the children, and the chance to live the lives of civilized human
beings, while at the same time the people will get coal at just what it
costs to mine it.
Of course that would be socialism as far as it goes. But you are not in
favor of that program. It is too visionary because it is so simple and
practical. So you will have to continue to wait until winter is upon you
before you get your coal and then pay three prices for it because you
insist upon voting a capitalist ticket and giving your support to the
present wage-slave system. The trouble with you is that you are still in
a capitalist state of mind.
Lincoln said: “If you want that thing that is the thing you want”; and
you will get it to your heart’s content. But some good day you will wake
up and realize that a change is needed and wonder why you did not know
it long before. Yes, a change is certainly needed, not merely a change
of party but a change of system; a change from slavery to freedom and
from despotism to democracy, wide as the world. When this change comes
at last, we shall rise from brutehood to brotherhood, and to accomplish
it we have to educate and organize the workers industrially and
politically, but not along the zigzag craft lines laid down by Gompers,
who through all of his career has favored the master class. You never
hear the capitalist press speak of him nowadays except in praise and
adulation. He has recently come into great prominence as a patriot. You
never find him on the unpopular side of a great issue. He is always
conservative, satisfied to leave the labor problem to be settled finally
at the banqueting board with Elihu Root, Andrew Carnegie and the rest
of the plutocratic civic federationists. When they drink wine and smoke
scab cigars together the labor question is settled so far as they are
concerned.
And while they are praising Gompers they are denouncing the I.W.W.
There are few men who have the courage to say a word in favor of the
I.W.W. I have. Let me say here that I have great respect for the I.W.W.
Far greater than I have for their infamous detractors.
Listen! There has just been published a pamphlet called “The Truth
About the I.W.W.” It has been issued after long and thorough
investigation by five men of unquestioned standing in the capitalist
world. At the head of these investigators was Professor John Graham
Brooks of Harvard University, and next to him John A. Fish of the Survey
of the Religious Organizations of Pittsburgh, and Mr. Bruere, the
government investigator. Five of these prominent men conducted an
impartial examination of the I.W.W. To quote their own words they
“followed its trail.” They examined into its doings beginning at Bisbee
where the “patriots,” the cowardly business men, the arch-criminals,
made up the mob that deported 1,200 workingmen under the most brutal
conditions, charging them with being members of the I.W.W. when they
knew it to be false.
It is only necessary to label a man “I.W.W.” to have him lynched as
they did Praeger, an absolutely innocent man. He was a Socialist and
bore a German name, and that was his crime. A rumor was started that he
was disloyal and he was promptly seized and lynched by the cowardly mob
of so-called “patriots.”
War makes possible all such crimes and outrages. And war comes in spite
of the people. When Wall Street says war the press says war and the
pulpit promptly follows with its Amen. In every age the pulpit has been
on the side of the rulers and not on the side of the people. That is one
reason why the preachers so fiercely denounce the I.W.W.
Take the time to read this pamphlet about the I.W.W. Don’t take the
word of Wall Street and its press as final. Read this report by five
impartial and highly reputable men who made their investigation to know
the truth, and that they might tell the truth to the American people.
They declare that the I.W.W. in all its career never committed as much
violence against the ruling class as the ruling class has committed
against the I.W.W.
You are not now reading any reports in the daily press about the trial
at Chicago, are you? They used to publish extensive reports when the
trial first began, and to prate about what they proposed to prove
against the I.W.W. as a gigantic conspiracy against the government. The
trial has continued until they have exhausted all their testimony and
they have not yet proven violence in a single instance. No, not one!
They are utterly without incriminating testimony and yet 112 men are in
the dock after lying in jail for months without the shadow of a crime
upon them save that of belonging to the I.W.W. That is enough it would
seem to convict any man of any crime and send his body to prison and his
soul to hell. Just whisper the name of the I.W.W. and you are branded
as a disloyalist. And the reason for this is wholly to the credit of the
I.W.W., for whatever may be charged against it the I.W.W. has always
fought for the bottom dog. And that is why Haywood is despised and
prosecuted while Gompers is lauded and glorified by the same gang.
Now what you workers need is to organize, not along craft lines but
along revolutionary industrial lines. All of you workers in a given
industry, regardless of your trade or occupation, should belong to one
and the same union.
Political action and industrial action must supplement and sustain each
other. You will never vote the Socialist republic into existence. You
will have to lay its foundations in industrial organization. The
industrial union is the forerunner of industrial democracy. In the shop
where the workers are associated is where industrial democracy has its
beginning. Organize according to your industries! Get together in every
department of industrial service! United and acting together for the
common good your power is invincible.
When you have organized industrially you will soon learn that you can
manage as well as operate industry. You will soon realize that you do
not need the idle masters and exploiters. They are simply parasites.
They do not employ you as you imagine but you employ them to take from
you what you produce, and that is how they function in industry. You can
certainly dispense with them in that capacity. You do not need them to
depend upon for your jobs. You can never be free while you work and live
by their sufferance. You must own your own tools and then you will
control your own jobs, enjoy the products of your own labor and be free
men instead of industrial slaves.
Organize industrially and make your organization complete. Then unite
in the Socialist Party. Vote as you strike and strike as you vote.
Your union and your party embrace the working class. The Socialist
Party expresses the interests, hopes and aspirations of the toilers of
all the world.
Get your fellow workers into the industrial union and the political
party to which they rightly belong, especially this year, this historic
year in which the forces of labor will assert themselves as they never
have before. This is the year that calls for men and women who have
courage, the manhood and womanhood to do their duty.
Get into the Socialist Party and take your place in its ranks; help to
inspire the weak and strengthen the faltering, and do your share to
speed the coming of the brighter and better day for us all.
When we unite and act together on the industrial field and when we vote
together on election day we shall develop the supreme power of the one
class that can and will bring permanent peace to the world. We shall
then have the intelligence, the courage and the power for our great
task. In due time industry will be organized on a cooperative basis. We
shall conquer the public power. We shall then transfer the title deeds
of the railroads, the telegraph lines, the mines, mills and great
industries to the people in their collective capacity; we shall take
possession of all these social utilities in the name of the people. We
shall then have industrial democracy. We shall be a free nation whose
government is of and by and for the people.
And now for all of us to do our duty! The clarion call is ringing in
our ears and we cannot falter without being convicted of treason to
ourselves and to our great cause.
Do not worry over the charge of treason to your masters, but be
concerned about the treason that involves yourselves. Be true to
yourself and you cannot be a traitor to any good cause on earth.
Yes, in good time we are going to sweep into power in this nation and
throughout the world. We are going to destroy all enslaving and
degrading capitalist institutions and re-create them as free and
humanizing institutions. The world is daily changing before our eyes.
The sun of capitalism is setting; the sun of socialism is rising. It is
our duty to build the new nation and the free republic. We need
industrial and social builders. We Socialists are the builders of the
beautiful world that is to be. We are all pledged to do our part. We are
inviting—aye challenging you this afternoon in the name of your own
manhood and womanhood to join us and do your part.
In due time the hour will strike and this great cause triumphant—the
greatest in history—will proclaim the emancipation of the working class
and the brotherhood of all mankind.
