"Yesterday"s demonstration was the result of a carefully planned plot matured for nearly a month by the foreign radical element of Lake County, Indiana. Its stated purpose was to protest against the conviction of Eugene V. Debs and Kate Richards O"Hare. An undercurrent of rumor among the radicals gave it a more significant meaning, however.
"On Thursday secret service men obtained copies of pamphlets printed in Russian, containing a formula for the manufacture of explosives. More literature calling for the overthrow of the government was circulated. A third series of pamphlets contained the Const.i.tution of the Russian Soviet Republic.
"Friday Morris Lieberman, head of the Socialists, called on Mayor Hodges for a permit to parade. It was refused with the explanation that riots such as caused two deaths in Cleveland were feared....
"Early yesterday morning radicals began to arrive in Gary. Cars from Indiana Harbor, Whiting, Hammond, Crown Point, and trains from Chicago brought them by the dozens.
"By noon several thousand had gathered in and near the Socialist headquarters, a mile south of the business district of Gary. Under portraits of Trotzky and Lenine they sang Russian songs and gathered about in knots waiting for "zero hour"--one o"clock.
"Lieberman, fearing bloodshed, decided to counsel his followers against a parade. They howled him down, however, and hotter heads took charge of the meeting. A dozen girls, with rolls of red ribbon, pinned a scarlet strip on the lapel of each man"s coat as he entered the meeting hall. Red neckties were abundant. Red hat bands made their appearance. Many wore scarlet carnations."
Judge Haas of the Munic.i.p.al Court of Gary thus commented on those arrested in the demonstration:
"All except Capolitto have failed to become citizens. All except him and one other tried to evade war service in our army, endeavoring to sneak out on the ground of not being citizens of this country. All they seem to want is to come over here and make trouble--out of twenty-one gun-toters who have been brought before me, nineteen have been foreigners and not even citizens."
The leaders of the Marxian movement, both in the United States and abroad, testify that to be a Socialist is to be a plotter against all existing forms of government. Marx and Engels, for instance, confess the truth of this in their celebrated "Communist Manifesto," which they addressed to their followers over half a century ago, and which is looked upon even today by the rank and file of the party as embodying the fundamental principles of International Socialism. "The Communists,"
we are told, "everywhere support every revolutionary movement against the existing social and political order of things" and "disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be obtained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions. Let the ruling cla.s.ses tremble at a communistic revolution."
We are indebted to the late August Bebel, the leader of the Socialists of Germany, for the confession that "along with the state die out its representatives--cabinet ministers, parliaments, standing armies, police and constables, courts, attorneys, prison officials, tariff and tax collectors, in short the whole political apparatus. Barracks and other such military structures, palaces of law and of administration, prisons--all will now await better use. Ten thousand laws, decrees and regulations become so much rubbish; they have only historic value."
["Women Under Socialism," by Bebel, page 319, of the 1904 edition in English.]
"The People," New York, May 13, 1900, in speaking of the relation of Socialism to existing forms of government, including our own, affirms that "while there is a very general idea that Socialism means an extension of the powers and functions of government, still this is a very natural and dangerous misconception, and one that ought to be guarded against." "Socialism," it adds, "does not mean the extension of government, but on the contrary it means the end, the elimination of government."
The "International Socialist Review," Chicago, February, 1912, together with many other magazines and papers current at the time, called attention to the fact that William D. Haywood, who for a long time had been before the eyes of the public on account of his revolutionary utterances and writings, declared in a speech at Cooper Union, in New York City, that the Socialists were conspirators against the United States Government.
"The Call," April 1, 1919, in an editorial note says that "the whole system of government in the United States, Federal, State and Munic.i.p.al, seems to be out of date."
Though the men who march behind the red flag, singing the Ma.r.s.eillaise of the French Revolution, usually deny to the general public, for reasons of political expediency, that the Socialist movement is a violent and revolutionary one, it is evident to those who have read their books, magazines, and papers, that the use of the ballot and education are not the means on which they rely finally for the establishment of their visionary commonwealth. Violence is advocated and habitually practised by the Socialists who const.i.tute the Industrial Workers of the World, whose banner with the inscription, "No G.o.d, No Master," has brought them into disrepute all over the country. Jack London, a Socialist widely known in the United States and England as a novelist, furnishes us with excellent reasons for believing that the International Socialist Party approves of violence and a.s.sa.s.sination, and thereby reaffirms its allegiance to the base principles of the French Commune. Writing in the "International Socialist Review" of August, 1909, Jack London made the following comment on the progress of Socialism in Russia:
"Our comrades in Russia have formed what they call "THE FIGHTING ORGANIZATION." This FIGHTING ORGANIZATION accused, tried, found guilty and condemned to death one Sipiaguin, Minister of the Interior. On April 2, he was shot and killed in the Maryinsky Palace. Two years later the FIGHTING ORGANIZATION condemned to death and executed another Minister of the Interior, Von Plehve.
Having done so it issued a doc.u.ment, dated July 29, 1904, setting forth the counts of its indictment of Von Plehve and its responsibility for the a.s.sa.s.sination. Now, and to the point, this doc.u.ment was sent out to the Socialists of the world, and by them was published everywhere in the magazines and newspapers. The point is, not that the Socialists of the world were unafraid to do it, but that they did it as a matter of routine, giving publication to what might be called an official doc.u.ment of International Revolutionary Movement."
August Bebel in "Unsere Ziele," page 44, expresses his sentiments on the subject of violence quite as frankly as Jack London. "We must not shudder," he tells us, "at the thought of the possible employment of violence; we must not raise an alarm cry at the suppression of existing rights, at violent expropriation, etc. History teaches that at all times new ideas, as a rule, were realized by a violent conflict with the defenders of the past, and that the combatants for new ideas struck blows as deadly as possible at the defenders of antiquity. Not without reason does Karl Marx, in his work on "Capital" exclaim: "Violence is the obstetrician that waits on every ancient society which is about to give birth to a new one; violence is in itself a social factor.""
As reference has just been made to Karl Marx, it will be well to call attention to the fact that the Father of modern Socialism, in "The Civil War in France," page 78, claims that "the workingmen"s Paris, with its Commune, will forever be celebrated as the glorious harbinger of a new society." The Commune, then, whose anniversary is celebrated on the 18th of March, every year, by the Socialists all over the world, has been, and still is considered the precursor of their contemplated state. The reign of terror and rebellion in which tens of thousands of Frenchmen met their death, while public buildings and priceless works of art were being burned or destroyed and many beautiful churches pillaged, is the boast of the Socialistic champions of universal peace. The Parisian mob of criminals and revolutionists, which was finally subdued by 150,000 French troops, after men and women had run about the streets with petroleum cans, firing public buildings and private houses and seizing many victims whom they hurried off to death, is, therefore, considered by the Socialists as one of the most ill.u.s.trious gatherings of persons recorded in history, and one worthy of special memory, honor and respect.
Victor Berger of Wisconsin, speaking in the 1908 National Convention of the Socialist Party in favor of an amendment to the party const.i.tution, proposed by Delegate Hazlett, to the effect that any person opposing political action should be expelled from the party, shows how little difference there is between the advocates of "political action," who are supposed to favor the use of the ballot, and the "direct actionists,"
who admit their preference for violence.
"I have heard it pleaded," said Berger, "many a time right in our own meetings by speakers that come to our meetings, that the only salvation for the proletariat of America is direct action, that the ballot box is simply a humbug. Now I don"t know how this question is going to be solved. I have no doubt that in the last a.n.a.lysis we must shoot, and when it comes to shooting, Wisconsin will be there. We always make good.... In order to be able to shoot even some day we must have the powers of political government in our hands, at least to a great extent.
I want that understood. So everybody who is talking to you about direct action and so on, and about political action being a humbug, is your enemy today, because he keeps you from getting the powers of political government." ["Proceedings of the 1908 National Convention of the Socialist Party," page 241.]
On July 31, 1909, we find Victor Berger, who posed as the special exponent of "political action," against the "anarchistic" element in his party, writing as follows in the "Social Democratic Herald" of Milwaukee:
"No one will claim that I am given to the reciting of revolutionary phrases. On the contrary I am known to be a constructive Socialist.
However, in view of the plutocratic law making of the present day, it is easy to predict that the safety and hope of this country will finally lie in one direction only, that of a violent and b.l.o.o.d.y revolution. Therefore, I say, each of the 500,000 Socialist voters and of the 2,000,000 workingmen who instinctively incline our way, should, besides doing much reading and still more thinking, also have a good rifle and the necessary rounds of ammunition in his home, and be prepared to back up his ballot with his bullets if necessary. This may look like a startling statement. Yet I can see nothing else for the American ma.s.ses today."
In the "Social Democratic Herald," August 14, 1909, Victor Berger drops a few more words on the same subject in an article ent.i.tled: "IF THIS BE TREASON, MAKE THE BEST OF IT." "There are two ways," says he, "of effecting great social changes in a republic--the ballot and the bullet.
If our people are not wise--if they are otherwise--then we may have use for both of them."
Now, if Berger is a specimen of the extreme "political actionist," a conservative, the enemy of "direct action," who can imagine the treasonable intentions and b.l.o.o.d.y thoughts of the immense number of "direct actionists" who throng the ranks of these national conspirators?
It is not flattering to the State of Wisconsin to realize that Berger has several times been chosen to represent one of its Congressional districts in the United States House of Representatives. Yet Berger has apt pupils. On January 12, 1919, Mayor Hoan of Milwaukee presided at a Milwaukee meeting of 8,000 "Reds" to protest against the conviction, under the Espionage Law, of Victor L. Berger and four co-conspirators, and prolonged cheering and waving of "Red" insignia answered the following words spoken by William Bross Lloyd (_Testimony, Socialist Trial, Albany, page 1623_):
"What we want is revolutionary preparedness. We want to organize.... We want a mobilization plan and an organization for the revolution. We want to get rifles, machine guns, field artillery, and the ammunition for it. You want to get dynamite. You want to tell off the men for the revolution when it starts here.
You want to tell off the men who are to take the dynamite to the armory doors and blow them in and capture the guns and ammunition there so that the capitalists won"t have any. You want to tell off the men to dynamite the doors of the banks to get the money to finance the revolution."
William D. Haywood and Frank Bohn are the joint authors of a pamphlet ent.i.tled, "Industrial Socialism," the revolutionary tenor of which may be gathered from the following lines:
"When the worker, either through experience or a study of Socialism, comes to know this truth [i.e., economic determinism], he acts accordingly. He retains absolutely no respect for the property rights of the profit takers. He will use any weapon which will win his fight. He knows that the present laws of property are made by and for the capitalists. Therefore he does not hesitate to break them."
Since Haywood and Bohn evidently had no intention of using paper-cap pistols and pop-guns as their weapons, and since they certainly did not mean to shoot at stone walls and forest trees, it seems strange that the Socialist Party, if it does not advocate such doctrines of violence, should sell these pamphlets at $6 per 100, according to a price list of its national office in Chicago.
To make matters still worse for the apologists of the Socialist Party of America, no less a personage than Eugene V. Debs commented as follows, in the "International Socialist Review," February, 1912, on the doctrines of Haywood and Bohn just referred to:
"We have here a matter of tactics upon which a number of comrades of ability and prominence have sharply disagreed. For my part, I believe the paragraph to be entirely sound. Certainly all Socialists knowing how and to what end capitalist property rights are established, must hold such rights in contempt.... As a revolutionist I can have no respect for capitalist property laws, nor the least scruple about violating them. I hold all such laws to have been enacted through chicanery, fraud and corruption, with the sole end in view of dispossessing, robbing and enslaving the working cla.s.s. But this does not imply that I propose making an individual law breaker of myself, and b.u.t.ting my head against the stone wall of existing property laws. That might be called force, but it would not be that. It would be mere weakness and folly. If I had the force to overthrow these despotic laws, I would use it without an instant"s hesitation or delay, but I haven"t got it, so I am law abiding under protest--not from scruple--and bide my time."
In the "Appeal to Reason," Girard, Kansas, September 2, 1911, there is an excellent specimen of one of Debs" revolutionary articles, which reads in part as follows:
"Let us arouse the working cla.s.s and invoke their power to smite the conspirators and set our brothers [the McNamaras] free. They can be saved in no other way. The lawyers will plead for them to deaf ears; organized labor will protest against their taking off in vain. We are confronted by a heartless, soulless plutocracy. Let us buckle on our armor and fight!... Let us marshal our forces and develop our power for the revolt! Let us develop without delay all the power we have, and prepare to strike in every way we know how.
With a general strike we can paralyze the plutocracy from coast to coast. Hundreds of thousands will join eagerly and serve loyally in the fight. We can stop the wheels, cut off the food supply, and compel the plutocrats in sheer terror to sue for peace.... A few men may be needed who are not afraid to die. Be ye also ready....
Let us swear that we will fight to the last ditch, that we will strike blow for blow, that we will use every weapon at our command, and that we will never surrender! Roll up a united Socialist vote in California that will shake the Pacific Coast like an earthquake, and back it up with a general strike that will paralyze the continent.... Let the st.u.r.dy toilers of the Pacific Coast raise the Red standard of revolt."
It was no other than this same Eugene V. Debs, the advocate of violence and revolution, who on May 17, 1912, was nominated as the presidential standard bearer of the Socialist Party. If ever elected, what a fine president he would make, this "poor," "persecuted," self-styled "flaming-revolutionist," now in jail! What an honorable party it must be that nominated such a man for the fourth successive time to fill the office of the presidency of our country! Indeed it was on the very same day that the followers of Karl Marx chose Debs as their candidate to rule the United States that they also declared, in the const.i.tution of their party, that any member who should advocate crime, sabotage or other methods of violence, as a weapon of the working cla.s.s to aid it in its emanc.i.p.ation, should be expelled from membership in the party!
Never can political Socialists convince the American people of their sincerity and honesty while they nominate for office men like Debs, send to Congress representatives like Victor Berger, and choose as members of their national executive committee persons of the stamp of William D.
Haywood. There was no better way for Socialists to convict themselves of hypocrisy than by retaining in their const.i.tution the clause against sabotage, referred to above, while at the same time selling at their National Office books like "Industrial Socialism" and publishing in their papers and magazines articles advocating and approving "direct action." By their deeds we judge them, and not by their hypocritical words.
"The Call," on April 28, 1919, introduces with the following headlines the long comment that it makes on the Hart-Nearing debate of April 27th in New York City: "Revolution Is Only Solution of World-Wide Unrest, Says Nearing." In the course of the article Scott Nearing"s suggestion of revolt is mentioned: "As against Professor Hart"s proposal of a League of Nations, I suggest revolution." The "New York Times," April 28, 1919, commented in part on the debate as follows:
""Who wants war?" asked Professor Hart. "Scott Nearing wants war and the people who think as he does, want war. Revolution is nothing but civil war and we see its result in the Russian revolution. Russia pa.s.sed through three revolutions and is that the kind of result we want in order to overthrow what he calls this robber nation?"
"A whirlwind of applause marked this and through the applause was heard a chorus of voices shouting "yes." The meeting cheered Nearing"s frequent references to "revolution," to the Russian Soviet Republic and applauded his radical utterances, although he had requested that he be permitted to speak without interruption.
The theatre contained about 3,000 persons who filled all the seats, the stage and stood in the aisles, after paying from 25 cents to $1.50 admission.
"Judging from the manifestations of approval of Nearing"s remarks, the large audience appeared to be overwhelmingly composed of revolutionary Socialists, and when the speaker declared he believed in a League of Socialist Nations the crowd vigorously applauded in a way that left no doubt of its sentiment."
"The Call" in its May Day issue, 1919, published an article on present-day revolutionary tactics of the Socialists:
"The world revolution, dreamed of as a thing of the distant future, has become a live reality, rising from the graves of the murdered millions and the misery and suffering of the surviving millions. It has taken form, it strikes forward, borne on by the despair of the ma.s.ses and the shining example of the martyrs. Its spread is irrepressible. The bridges are burnt behind the old capitalist society and its path is forever cut off. Capitalist society is bankrupt and the only salvation of humanity lies in the uprising of the ma.s.ses, in the victory of the Socialist revolution, in the renovating forces of Socialism.
"The world war which is now about to be officially closed has slid into a condition neither war nor peace. However, the war of the nations has been followed by the war of the cla.s.ses. The cla.s.s struggle is no longer fought by resolutions and demonstrations.
Threateningly it marches through the streets of the great cities for life or death."
CHAPTER XV