I have said that these "down tools" outbursts are anti-Socialist. They are anti-Socialist because they are anarchical. They may pull down, but they cannot build up. Socialism and Socialists have suffered enough during the war because of the freaks and cranks that the war discovered among us, and the greater number of the same genus who now profess to be Socialists without understanding much, if anything, about the Socialist movement. We do not want further prejudice raised against us by attempts to connect us with anarchical violence, hooliganism and looting. Nothing for the benefit of the people can possibly come out of what is now going on. All it will do is to help reaction, and make even the majority of the working class ready to acquiesce in a mild military dictatorship as a lesser evil than Bolshevist tyranny and violence. And there are some British Generals who are popular, and who are not merely militarists! There is no royal road to the Social Revolution. The steady and patient work of Socialist propaganda and organisation together with the pressing forward of thorough-going collectivist proposals for the ownership and control of industry for the common good, and the imagination to take advantage of everything that will help forward the great change from capitalist production for profit to Socialist production for use--those are the lines we must follow. All the imaginary shortcuts of the impatient ones, which lead to anarchical deserts or reactionary morasses, serve only to retard real Social-Democratic progress. FOOTNOTES: [1] Comrade "R.," who has written much for "Justice" on the food question abroad, has supplied these particulars.--H.W.L. [2] "The Great Strike Movement of 1911, and Its Lessons." +----------------------------------------------------------+ | For accurate and reliable information on International | | Labour and Socialist movements | | and happenings read... | | | | "JUSTICE." | | | | The oldest Socialist Journal in Great Britain. | | | | =Published every Thursday, price Twopence.= | | | | Of all Newsagents, or direct from the Publishers, | | Twentieth Century Press (1912) Ltd., 37-38 Clerkenwell | | Green, London. E.C. 1 Subscription rates: 13 weeks, | | 2/6; 26 weeks, 5/-; 52 weeks, 10/-; post free. | +----------------------------------------------------------+